The Strawberry Or The Violin
by iSnowX3
Summary: Ikuto had been told that he could never fall in love since it'll get in the way of his future career as a violin prodigy. But what if he begins to fall in love with the small pinkette that his music teacher adopted? He'll have to give one up, but which?
1. Lovely Melody

**Well here's another new story.. you would've thought that by now I would be done with writing. But sadly, I've got no life 8D So I'm not done yet. I'm not even close.**

**Thanks for the 7OO+ reviews on **_**For His Sake**_**! I never expected that the number would get that high, and I doubt that any of my next stories could top that.**

**And also thanks to you kind people who bothered to vote in the poll :) That's the reason why I'm doing this story. _The Strawberry or The Violin _won.. by a lot surprisingly.**

**Well.. here goes nothing...**

**_AGES:_**

**_Amu, Nadeshiko, and Nagihiko - 4  
Ikuto - 9  
Utau - 6_**

**_All Adults: Older. That's all you need to know._**

**Utau and Ikuto aren't related anymore :) Beacause that would screw up my story.**

* * *

**- kindergarden classroom -**

"Bye bye Nade-Chan!" Amu shouted out, waving goodbye to her friend.

Nadeshiko turned around and smiled politely. She gave her best friend a quick hug.

"See you tomorrow," She said cheerfully. "Don't forget that we still need to finish drawing that picture!"

Amu grinned. Of course she wouldn't forget. She loved the time she spent at school; it was the only time she could see Nadeshiko. That best friend of hers had to practice dancing whenever she was outside of school.

Nadeshiko's mother impatiently gave the purple-haired girl's hand a light squeeze.

"Nadeshiko," She scolded her daughter. "Hurry up. You have dance practice soon, and Nagi's already waiting in the car."

Amu smiled at the mention of Nagihiko. He was Nadeshiko's twin brother, and Amu always thought the two of them looked really cute together.

Nadeshiko smiled and gave Amu one last wave before following her mother out of the school building.

As soon as the two of them disappeared from sight, Amu turned back around to look at a woman who was leaning against the frame of the door. The woman returned the gaze, her blue eyes filled with worry. Amu frowned.

"Hoshina-sensei doesn't look very happy," She commented like the innocent child she was. 'Hoshina-sensei' smiled and shook her head, her blonde hair swishing against her back.

"No, I'm fine," She corrected Amu. "I'm just a bit worried, that's all. Normally Nadeshiko is the last one to get picked up from school. You're usually one of the first. I can't help but wonder where your parents are today..."

Amu shrugged the whole situation off, completely worry-free. She figured her parents were just taking a while to drive here. She still lived in a childish world, where she could rely on a logical, believeable explanation for anything from her parents. The most she would worry about on the day-to-day to basis was what she was having for dinner and whether her mother had time to stop by a store and buy Amu some candy while driving home.

The pink-haired girl all of a sudden felt a strange urge to go play on the swings in the playground outside. She ran towards the door leading there, her teacher following closely behind her.

**- two hours later -**

Amu sat on the carpeted floor of the classroom, curled up into a petite little ball. The sky outside was dark, the moon shining brightly, yet her parents still hadn't showed up.

Shockingly, she still wasn't worried. The small girl was more worried about her now very hungry stomach, which her teacher had tried to soothe using random snacks she could find in her purse and around the classroom.

"Amu," She said, sounding very concerned. "Did your parents tell you anything about them being late in picking you up today?"

Amu looked up and shook her head.

Suddenly, the classroom phone began to ring. Hoshina-sensei walked over to it and picked it up.

"Hello?" She said into the receiver.

...

She gasped.

"My god!" She exclaimed. This was enough to get Amu to lift up her head and look at her teacher in curiousity. "Are you serious?"

...

"Don't worry. I'll drive her right over," She said quickly before hanging up the phone. Amu stood up and walked towards her teacher.

"Hoshina-sensei," She said in her adorable-sounding voice. "Who was that?"

The teacher spoken of sighed. She grabbed Amu's small hand and pulled her out of the classroom.

"Sensei!" Amu tried asking again. "What are you doing?"

She got no answer until she was properly strapped into her teacher's car.

"Hoshina-sensei!" Amu said again, tears beginning to form in her eyes. "What's going on?"

"We're going to your parents," The teacher said quietly. That answer was enough to satisfy Amu, so she wiped away her tears and stayed silent for the rest of the car trip.

**- hospital -**

Hoshina-sensei pulled Amu into the waiting room of the emergency room and led her to one of the empty seats.

"Stay here," She instructed before disappearing into one of the large doors.

Of course, children like Amu didn't like being left alone in public areas. Amu got off the seat, wandering around the waiting room aimlessly.

She eyed the door that her teacher had went through, wondering what was behind that door. What was so urgent that she had to be dragged her and told to wait while something went on on the other side of the door.

Curious, Amu climbed onto one of the chairs and stood on it to get a better view from the glass windows on the door. Inside she saw a long hallway, so long that the pinkette couldn't even begin to see the ending of it.

She saw Hoshina-sensei in the hallway, pacing back and forth in front of a door about three doors down from the one Amu was looking through. There was a nervous look on her face, and her pace seemed to grow quicker with every step.

_What could be worrying sensei so much...? And where are Mama and Papa?_

The door her teacher was standing in front of suddenly opened. A solemn looking doctor walked out of it, shaking his head sadly. Amu pressed her her face against the glass, hoping to hear a bit of what he was saying.

Unfortunately, all she heard were some low whispers from the doctor. Too quiet for Amu to distinctly hear everything he was saying. But she did see her teacher growing less nervous, but more and more with every word he was saying.

Although, she heard the next thing clearly. Hoshina-sensei had clasped her hands over her mouth, a small horrifed scream escaping her terrified lips. Amu frowned. She was extremely confused. What could be making her so frightened?

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

"You can't be serious!" The teacher gasped. Despite all the other children she taught, Amu seemed to have this strange aura around her. It made her stand out from everyone else, and it made everyone almost instantly love her. And that included the teacher herself, who had come to love Amu as almost a daughter.

Letting Amu know about something like this could crush the little pink-haired girl's heart.

The doctor frowned.

"There has to be some way to save them!" Hoshina-sensei continued. "They still have a daughter to care for, you know?!"

The doctor shook his head again. He glanced again inside the room he had just come out of, where there two bodies on the beds. Both were completely covered by a white cloth each.

"I'm sorry," He said apologetically. "But there was no way anyone could've survived an explosion like that."

The teacher remembered once hearing how dangerous, yet high-paying, it was to work in those chemical labs. Yet Amu's parents still decided to work in a place like that. Look what happened now. Both are gone, leaving their little four year old alone in the world without parents.

"Well, can you tell me which one of their relatives live closest to here?" She suggested. "I can drive their daughter to them. She could stay there until everything gets sorted out."

The doctor smiled and nodded.

"Yes I can," He said. "And by the way, you're a really kind teacher. I can think of so many other teachers off the top of my head that would never go through this kind of trouble just for a student."

Without waiting for a reply, he flipped through a folder of loose papers to look for the piece of information that Hoshina-sensei asked for.

"Oh my," He said, frowning at the papers. "She doesn't have any."

The teacher frowned.

"What do you mean by any?" She asked slowly.

"She has no relatives nearby," The doctor explained. "In fact, the only relatives she does have live all the way in America, and they haven't been seen in ages. I would know, I was good friends with one of them a while back. No contact from them in years."

Hoshina-sensei frowned and thought for a moment.

"Then I'll take her in," She decided. "I'll go ahead and try to find Amu's relatives. But until I do, she can stay with me. My daughter, Utau, has always wanted a little sister anyways. This'll probably the closet she'll ever get."

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

The teacher stepped back into the waiting room to find Amu, curled up fast asleep on one of the chairs.

"Eh... Amu-chan?" Hoshina-sensei said in a soft tone, gently poking the small child. Amu mumbled something in her sleep before lazily opening one eye halfway.

"Ho-Hoshina-sensei?" She asked sleepily, her eyes widening to their full extent when she saw who was standing next to her.

"Come on," Her teacher said to her softly, helping her off the chair. "It's time to go."

Amu was about to follow when she remembered something.

"Where are Mama and Papa?" She asked. Her teacher sighed.

"Just come with me," She said in a voice that told Amu that she shouldn't ask anymore questions. Amu followed that, and was silent until they were back in the car.

Her teacher turned to look at her.

"Amu," She said in her most gentle voice possible. "You're mama and papa... they're not here. They went somewhere, but they'll be back... later..."

Amu's eyes snapped up.

"Did they go to that special place?" She asked quietly. "That special place in the sky, where Mama told me that Grandma is in right now? Are Mama and Papa there right now?"

Hoshina nodded.

"Oh."

To be honest, the teacher was surprised at the short response she got. "Oh." But then again, this was one of those topics where you either cried your eyes out immediately, or you decide to seal all your feelings away from everyone else in your heart and cry it out silently. She figured that Amu was more the the second type.

Amu shrugged. Her pink bangs fell in front of her small face.

"So you'll be staying with me for a while," Hoshina continued. At this, Amu's eyes lit up. The teacher smiled warmly.

_That little girl is just too adorable._

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

Amu stepped into the Hoshina's residence, eyes filled with surprised awe. The house was a lot bigger than the one she was used to living in, so she felt like a peasant who just walked into a castle.

Though the many expensive looking items scattered around the house amazed Amu to a great extent, they weren't what held the majority of her attention.

The soft, sweet tune of a song floated gracefully around the house. It was a slow song, full of sorrow yet still filled with the perfect amount of beauty. This song was what Amu focused on. It's sound was the most beautiful thing to have ever reached the small child's ears.

Amu ran in the direction the music was coming from. She ended up in a rather large room located farther back on the first floor of the house. Inside the room was filled with every music instrument, everything from a grand piano to a acoustic guitar.

In the center of the room, a boy stood, playing the violin. His dark blue hair fell in front of his eyes, but he didn't notice as he was so concentrated in the violin. The boy looked to be about nine or ten, five years older than Amu.

Beside him, a much older man sat, listening to the music with an intense concentration, as if he was set on finding as many errors in the song as he could.

Amu, being the naive child she was, did what her first impluse was to do. She bolted into the room and stopped right in front of the boy, startling him. The song stopped instantly.

"Who are you?" He asked smoothly. "And why are you here?"

* * *

**Eh.. this didn't come out as good as I expected :\ Looks to me like a load of bull-crap.**

**Review if you want. I don't care. But I still will delete this if there's not enough for my liking.. this I've done for all my fail stories. Which explains why this is only my fourth story in almost six months.**

**:) I'm sleepy. I'll just end it here.**


	2. Beginning

**Thank you darkjewl, Futakomori, tsukiyomiarisa, A-shadow-of-a-doubt, Kuro Neko-chan, XYNDiCATE, Neji0932, RandomlyBoredWolfy, Random-Bubbles159, TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi, SK8T3R-G1RL, Amuto20174, sylvanicara, Himeka Tsukiyomi, Natsuya801923, AliceRosen, tiki0112number2, appupuppu, a_crying_sakura, MaroonAngel of Darkeness, TornAngelWings, Kags21, Strawberry-Sonic-Babe, Pikachuwolffox4, Your Secret Admirer, BlueAmuto, and Amuto fan for reviewing!**

**Fanfiction is being a butthead again, and it's not letting me reply to reviews :\ So I'll try to reply to them all here. Right now:**

**darkjewl: **Heck, it'll always be a load of bull crap to me :) Whether you think it is or not.

**Futakomori: **Well I made them children because you never see them as children. I wanted to make it unique from all those other cliche stories out there.

**Tsukiyomi arisa: **Thank you :D

**A-shadow-of-a-doubt: **Of course Amu's cute :O Amu-chan's _adorable_.. whether she's in my fanfiction or not!

**Kuro Neko-Chan: **Well there will be a second chapter... because I'm writing it right now ._.

**XYNDiCATE: **DD: Still. Well in two of my other fanfics Amu's parents have died o_o So that's a pretty predictable and easy to write path for me. Closet.. hm... Well Amu and Utau = closet now :)

**Neji0932: **Well I'm not deleting it right now, am I?

**Kuro Neko-Chan: **... Didn't I just reply to your review...? You reviewed twice o_o With the same thing in each one.

**RandomlyBoredWolfy: **Well I'm not going to delete it anymore. And thank you for _lurving _it.

**Random-Bubbles159: **Thankies :)

**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatsui: **Well how else would you tell a little four year old girl that their parents are in a better place? And thank you!

**SK8T3R-G1RL: **Thank you :D

**Amuto201794: **Seriously? I could name ten fanfictions off the top of my head that are way better than mine.

**sylvanicara: **Nuclear plants are awesome :) Lots of things blowing up.

**Himkea Tsukiyomi: **Well I'm updating now, aren't I?

**Natsuya801923: **I was going to... but then I couldn't think of enough stuff for a whole new chapter. Utau and Ikuto aren't related :) Because I don't want them to be. I've always wanted to see what would happen if Nadesihko and Nagihiko could have face-to-face conversation, so now we'll finally find out XD Nope it's not Souko. Souko can go and still be Ikuto's mom. Utau's mom is.. someone who I haven't really thought of yet :3 Well you can't really imagine Tsumungu at a normal job, can you? *points gun at Satelight* animate my kiss scene. _Now. _Well.. I don't know :) I hadn't really thought about Amu's thoughts for most of this.*glomps Ikuto with you* And well... *counts*... two so far :) No reviews in 12 hours. It was so saddening.

**AliceRose: **You don't look very need to me :)

**tiki0112number2: **... Thanks?

**appupuppu: **I'm not deleting it if I'm writing the second chapter.

**a_crying_sakura: **Wonderful. I read fanfics all the time while my mom's lecturing me.

**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **Well I' m continuing.

**TornAngelWings: **When is Amu not? :)

**Kags21: **Second chapter being written right now.

**Strawberry-Sonic-Babe: **Really? Well I never have been good at portraying a four year old's mind...

**Pikachuwolffox4: **Thanks!

**Your Secret Admirer: **I see you too! :O Snowie.. that sounds so cute :) Sure you can call me that!

**BlueAmuto: **Yup. Complete opposites. What a nice change.

**Amuto fan: **Thanks! :D I'm not going to delete the story now. So many nice people in this world.

**... And I have to admit, 28 is a new high for the reviews I've gotten on the first chapter of a story o_o**

**OH YEAH AND HELP ME. Me and a friend got into this really... random fight :) For the word "pedophile", is it pronounced ****_peh_dophile or ****_pee_dophile? ... Yeah we're weird. ANYWAYS TELL US :O**

**By the way, I found this awesome site :) It was one of the sponsor adds at the top of GMail. Anways, I totally want one of those shirts... especially the 'glomp!' one. Fanfic dorks ftw :D**

**http://www . zazzle . com/artsyandroid/fanfiction?gclid=CKOtw6KFn5wCFRYiagodqB5ueA**

**... Oh and fear the OOC Souko :)**

**_Ages are the same as last chapter._**

* * *

Amu blinked up at the boy. He stared back down at her with a bored expression on his face.

She blinked again.

"That song was pretty," She commented softly. The boy raised an eyebrow, his expression remaining smooth and expressionless. For a moment, Amu was scared that she had offended him in some strange, unknown way.

But instead, he did quite the contrary. Laughing, the boy looked down and gave Amu a small smirk.

"Really?" He asked, pointing a finger in the direction of the man next to him. "He keeps saying that there's a lot of problems with my playing."

Amu frowned.

"No," She said. "It sounds good."

The man, who was sitting there and silently observing the conversation, stood up and placed a hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Ikuto," He chided. "Both her and I am right. It's true, for a nine year old you're playing the song quite well. Some of my students are twice as old as you and are struggling at the song. But, it's also true that there's quite a few mistakes with it."

Amu's eyes widened.

_So his name's Ikuto..._

Her still small mind slowly did the math.

_I'm four... and he's nine.. so he's... five years older than me! And then twice as much as nine is.... a big number. Something very big? _(A/N. math fail T_T) _So Ikuto can play just as good as people that are old?!_

Ikuto shrugged. The man behind him eyed the clock hanging on the wall.

"Well," He said, releasing Ikuto's shoulder. "Your lesson's done for today. We can work on the song some more then."

Ikuto, however, was barely listening to what his teacher was saying. He had grabbed a strand few strands of Amu's hair, twirling them and beginning to play around with the pink locks. He stopped after a few moments, holding a section of the bangs of the left side and the rest of the pink hair in two bunches on either side of Amu's head .

"You should tie up your hair like this," He commented, holding it for a moment more for Amu to remember how it look and felt before releasing it. "It looks better on you."

Without waiting for a response, he walked off, giving the girl's pink hair a slight ruffle before leaving. Amu couldn't take her eyes off of him. As Ikuto was leaving, a new girl skipped up to him. She had long blonde hair, tied up into two cute ponytails, and wide purple eyes.

"Ikuto!" She squealed, wrapping both her arms around one of his. Ikuto twitched visibly.

"Utau," He muttered angrily, trying to pull himself away from the girl. However, he made no progress.

"Utau!" Ikuto shouted again. "Get off me!"

Utau shook her head and looked up at him with a pouting face.

"Give me a goodbye kiss first," She said, her lower lip jutting out adorably. Ikuto glared at her.

"No way!" He told her. "That's disgusting!"

(A/N. He's still nine. Remember that.)

Utau frowned.

"Pleaseeeee?" She begged, her violet eyes glimmering with hope. Ikuto sighed. He bent down and leaned forward, letting his lips barely brush Utau's cheek.

But if was enough to send her off into a screaming frenzy. The blonde girl shrieked in excitement, releasing her tight grip to jump up and down.

Almost instantly, Amu's teacher was at the side of the two children. She placed her arms on Utau's shoulder, trying to calm the extreme amount of jumping.

"Utau!" She scolded. "Be polite! You're going to scare Amu!"

At this, Ikuto turned his head back around to look at Amu, who was still standing in the room with a confused expression plastered on her face. He smirked.

"So you're _Amu_," He said, putting an unecessary emphasis on the pinkette's name. Amu didn't know whether that was an insult or a compliment. "Nice meeting you."

As soon as Ikuto turned his back to Amu again, Utau sent a nasty glare in her direction. Amu flinched. No one has ever looked at her in such a mean way before.

Ikuto shrugged and left. He was still at the age where he thought that girls were weird and a bit disgusting, and he didn't want anything to have to do with Amu and Utau.

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

As Ikuto stepped out of the Hoshina residence, he sighed as he saw a car waiting for him. The driver wasn't his mother. It wasn't his father. It was one of those riduclously formal people that were hired by his parents to drive him places when his parents couldn't do it themselves.

His father had left to join some band, only coming back every now and then to visit. And his mother had some sort of strange belief that some of Ikuto's father musical talent had rubbed off on to Ikuto.

Because of that, Ikuto was now stuck with long violin lessons every day. Sure, he had come to love the violin, but having to play it that much every day became pretty boring and monotonous.

The car ride home was pretty silent, since Ikuto tried his best not to talk to those drivers. He despised them all anyways. In the midst of the silence, he took some time to think about what he did after his violin lesson. He had played with Amu's hair, along with emphasizing her name when using the word in a sentence.

Why did he do it?

Well he had no idea why. In fact, he didn't even realize he did until afterwards, when Amu was giving him weird looks behind his back.

_Why _did he do it?

The car came to a stop in front of his house. Ikuto climbed out of the vehicle without a word, walking into the house where his mother was waiting for him.

Tsukiyomi Souko, otherwise known as Ikuto's mother, gazed out an open window casually, her golden hair falling in front of her face. However, as soon as she saw Ikuto standing in the doorway, she immediately swept it all behind her ear and gave him a bright smile.

"Ikuto!" She said cheerfully. "How was you violin class today?"

Ikuto shrugged. Nothing that happened there today was out of the usual, except for... Amu showing up towards the end.

"There was this little girl who showed up after the class," He said softly. "She just ran in while I was in the middle of playing a song and told me I played really well."

Souko raised an eyebrow.

"And what did you say after that?" She asked. There was a slight egde to her voice. "Did you do anything?"

Ikuto nodded half-heartedly.

"I kind of..." He said, soudning a bit embarassed of what he was about to say next. "Kind of... played with her hair, and found out a way to make it look really good..."

"Ikuto." Souko cut in sharply. "Don't talk to that girl ever again. You're going to get distracted from your violin, and you'll never be as good as your father."

Ikuto took a step back, a bit shocked. His mother never talked to him that way.. at least not that he could remember.

Souko seemed to have realized this also, for there was suddenly a guilty look on her face. She rushed over to her son, bending down next to his short figure.

"Gomen!' She exclaimed apologetically. "It's just... you're father focused a lot on music his whole life, and now look at him. He's famous world-wide. He's the pride of this whole family. I want you to follow in his footsteps, be just like him."

Ikuto nodded. He understood... sort of. Meaning he knew that his mother was very proud of his father, and she wanted to be very proud of Ikuto too. But he kind of figured there was probably some sort of complexity to the whole thing, and that was the part he didn't quite understand yet.

Still, Amu... she was different than other girls that he knew. At the school Ikuto went to, most girls were totally into that "try to kiss a boy" game. Ikuto found the whole thing pretty paranoid and annoying, since he was usually their number one target for some reason. Amu was the first girl he had come across that hadn't glomped him and attempted to smother him in kisses yet.

Maybe it was because she looked pretty little. She couldn't be more than five, could she? That would probably explain it. She's probably never even heard of that riduculous game yet.

But the back of Ikuto's mind wondered if Amu would be just like all those other girls once she grew famliar with the game. That pink-haired girl was interesting, whatever he guessed she would do would probably be wrong.

"So Ikuto," Souko said, interupting Ikuto's thoughts. "You're not going to go back to that girl, fall in love, get her pregnant then run away with her, right?"

She laughed, her face filled with a joking feeling. But you could see under that was a small chunk of pure worry, as if that might actually happen oned day.

Ikuto made a disgusted face.

"No way!" He said like the child he still was. "That's disgusting!"

... was it really?

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

"Okay!" Amu's teacher said, smiling at Utau and Amu. "So Utau, now that you know why Amu's going to be staying with us for a while, show her around for me will you? And Amu, now you know not to go interupt Ikuto's music lessons anymore."

Amu nodded, only half understanding. But she got the main part of what she was supposed to know: stay out of the room when she could hear a violin. And that was pretty much all she needed to know.

She smiled up at her teacher.

"Okay, Hoshina-sensei!" Amu said sweetly, looking at Utau. "Nice to meet you, Utau-chan!"

Utau smiled politely, eyeing her mother as the woman left the room. As soon as she was out of sight, Utau's smile twisted back into that glare from earlier. Amu frowned back at it.

"Listen," Utau hissed. "Stay away from Ikuto."

Amu tilted her head to one side in an adorable fashion.

"Why?" She asked innocently. "He seems like a nice guy."

Utau's glare grew even meaner, if that was possible.

"Because I said so," She said proudly, like the selfish six year old she was. "He's only supposed to talk to _me, _not you."

Her hate-filled eyes took on a more dreamy look, as if her head suddenly decided to float into the clouds.

"Someday," She said, mostly to herself instead of Amu. "Me and Ikuto-kun are going to get married. Then we're going to have two kids and live in a big house just like Mommy and Daddy do."

(A/N. This is perfectly logical for a six year old to think of. According to my parents, I wrote my first romance story when I was in first grade. Deal with it.)

Amu smiled at Utau.

"Sounds like a really nice life," She said. "Souds perfect, actually. I hope that type of life actually happens to you!"

Utau let out a gasp of surprise. She always thought that a girl would put up a fight for someone like Ikuto. Guess she was wrong.

She gave Amu a shy smile. Utau was just like any other rich, only-child. They were so used to getting their way. Anyone who disagreed with them would be instantly hated. And if they agreed the next moment, they could be instantly loved again.

And now that Amu had said that she hoped that Utau actually gets Ikuto, Utau decided that she would be in the 'instantly loved' category.

"Maybe we could be friends!" She said cheerfully, reaching out to grab Amu's tiny hand. Amu returned the smile, completely forgetting Utau's treatment towards her only a few minutes before. She loved friends.

"Okay!" She exclaimed happily. Utau pulled her along and proceeded to show her all the places she needed to know about around the house. Amu smiled to herself.

_Everyone's here is so nice...._

_

* * *

_

**The ending's rushed. Deal with it. I don't want to edit this right now.**

**I'm tired, even though it's barely 4:3O in the afternoon.  
I'm pissed off.  
I'm hungry. (skipped half of dinner last night + breakfast and lunch today)  
And my head hurts. A lot.**

**So I'm going to end the chapter here.**

**Don't forget to review. **


	3. Tears

**Thank you amuto fan, sylvanicara, Neji0932, TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi, AliceRosen, Kuro Neko no Serenade, amuto fan, animegirl67213, MaroonAngelofDarkness, balloon . peppermint, SK8T3R G1RL, mikohoshina, xhappily-randomx, 4everAmuto, tikki0112number2, kags21, bendercat, Rini-chan95, Strawberry-sonic-babe,** **PLEASE, kuro neko-chan, a-shadow-of-a-doubt, Your Secret Admirer, xXneko-sanXx, tsukiyomi arisa, animeluver1234, emma louve, kaggie101, Amuto20174, and Pikachuwolffx4 for reviewing!**

**Review replies! :**

**amuto fan: **Well I'm not deleting it anymore, am I? :DD  
**sylvanicara: **Wow... yup. Not-so-perverted Ikuto is growing into very-perverted Ikuto.  
**Neji0932: ** Well my parents are alot like that too. Only it's "I have to be just like my mom" instead of my dad. So it's easy for me to write about something like that, since I can base it off somethings that really happened to me.. not really. Souko's going to go to the extremes.  
**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi: **Young love is cute :) And Amu's only four, you can't expect her to be that great at math yet. And yes Amu is very cute :D  
**AliceRosen: **I'll be taking my one thousan dollars now, please :)  
**Kuro Neko no Serenade: **Really? I've never seen a book that had something like this before. Hm.. maybe I did it without knowing. And yeah, it's going to be a 'through the years' kind of thing until Amu's a bit older. Well... Kazoumi can't exactly play many musical instruments, so I'm guessing he isn't.  
**amuto fan: **... Wasn't there already an "amuto fan" that reviewed..? Oh well, gues it's two anonymous people who used the same name. Not that I really care. Well thanks for loving it!  
**animegirl67213: **I will U-P-D-A-T-E :D  
**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **It can't exactly be an Amuto story if Ikuto's not interested in Amu at some point in the story, can it? "Satisfy your needs" o_o... what needs? I don't feel like I need anything right now.  
**balloon . peppermint: **Of course they're going to grow up. It's not like a four year old can do much in their love life.  
**SK8TER G1RL: **Amu's always cute in my imagination :D *does Spongebob imagination rainbow thing* ... crap. So my whole life I've been pronouncing it wrong?! DDD:  
**mikohoshina: **Thank you!  
**xhappily-randomx: **They are cute, aren't they? :) And thanks!  
**4everAmuto: **Well you're an anonymous, so it wouldn't matter how many times you change your name. But yes, 4everAmuto is way shorter than a_crying_sakura. And.. you giggle... alot...  
**tikki0112number2: **Yes it's cute. I'm updating now.  
**kags21: **Well he had to start smirking at some time in his life. Why not start with when he was a kid?  
**bendercat: **Thank you!  
**bendercat: **Anything that blows up in general is awesome.  
**rini-chan95: **Yes yes. Poor Amu-chan D:  
**strawberry-sonic-babe: **Heh... wait till he gets older ._. Because that's when a little hell hole called sex-ed comes along. I like being oblivious too :D even though I'm already 13. It's so much fun. ... OH COME ON. So I really have been pronouncing it wrong my whole life! D:  
**PLEASE: **Well I'm updating now, aren't I?  
**Kuro neko-chan: **Oh, I see now. I'm updating now :)  
**a-shadow-of-a-doubt: **But if the child has less freedom, then they'll become more disciplined when they grow up. That's what Souko's trying to aim for.  
**Your Secret Admirer: **Eh.. I never push myself hard enough during the school year, so I have all this leftover willpower. I just use it up in the summer doing something extremely pointless :) Yeah. My mom told me. She totally freaked out when she first saw it because I put a make-out scene in... And if you were 12 last year... that means you're 13 this year.. just like me! :) Bye bye!  
**xXneko-sanXx: **continuous.. That sounds like a cool word :) c o n t i n u o u s xDD  
**tsukiyomi arisa: **.. bye bye? :3  
**animeluver1234: **Amu is adorable :D  
**emma louve: **Well all my stories will always be 'fail stories' in my opinion. I don't like making them the same age as everyone else. But sooner or later they will be that age.  
**Kaggie101: **Oh yes, it is very bull-crappish. Don't deny it. And if Amu's parents didn't die then how would she meet Ikuto then? Of course. All Amu and Ikuto love moments are cute :)  
**Kaggie101: **Well there will always be selfish people in this world. You just have to learn to get used to them.  
**Amuto20174: **:DD I know, right? Ikuto, Utau, Amu = cute :)  
**PikachuWolffx4: **Yay! It's _not _awesome!

**Meh.. only three weeks of summer left. And I'm going to be gone again. Next Wednesday. Gone for six days. I'll probably still have internet connection but won't be able to udate :\ Sucks really. Especially since I probably won't be able to write like this when the school year starts.**

**Oh yeah, and I'l also be doing it a lot quicker through ages now. Like last time Amu was four. Then I'll do one or two chapters of Amu when she's five. Then a few when she's six. All the way up until she's a decent age.**

**_Ages:_**

**_Amu: 5  
Ikuto: 1O  
Utau: 7_**

**_Adults: old. _**

* * *

Ikuto sat on the steps leading to the front door of the Hoshina residence, idly waiting for his lesson time to start. Like always, his mom had dropped him off way too early, so he had to resort to sitting there to wait.

He sighed, stretching out on the steps and closing his eyes. He hated sitting out here, but he didn't want to go inside and be a bother to anyone either.

"Utau-chan! I bet I'll get home faster than you!"

Ikuto opened one eye and saw Amu running towards the house with Utau a little ways behind her. As Amu bounded up the steps, she didn't notice Ikuto laying there. She tripped, her body landing right on top of Ikuto.

The blue-haired boy blinked. When he opened his eyes again, he saw Amu, looking like her body and been flung carelessly on top of his torso. Amu struggled to pull herself back up again.

Ikuto smirked and shook his head as he easily sat up. Little kids were so fun to watch. He helped Amu up, straightening out her messed up hair and clothes and standing her up.

"There," He said. "Now it looks like you never feel."

Amu smiled brightly at him.

"Thank you, Ikuto!" She said cheerfully. Ikuto grinned and stood up next to her. Amu had been staying with the Hoshina's for a year, and the two of them had done an endless amount of talking since she came. Ikuto found it really easy to talk to her since she was the only girl that didn't try to glomp him whenever he was seen... and little kids will agree with anything you say so there was no argument between them.

"Ikuto! You're here early again!"

Ikuto looked up from Amu and saw Utau running towards him. He sighed. Seeing Utau was so troublesome for him.

"Neh, Ikuto-kun..." Utau said, giving her idol a big hug. "Can you play me a song on your violin? Onegai?"

Ikuto rolled his eyes and turned back to look at Amu, who was slowly heading back into the house.

"Amu..." He hissed, low enough so that Utau couldn't hear. "Help. Me."

Amu turned around and nodded. She was accustomed to this. Utau would come over to Ikuto, and Ikuto would bribe Amu with something, usually candy, to get Utau away from him. Of course, the only reason Amu did this at all was for the rewards she would get afterwards.

Obviously Ikuto could easily get away from the blond fanatic, but he chose to have Amu help him instead.

Why?

He had no idea.

Maybe because his method required injuring Utau in some way, and he didn't want to hurt her, even though he had a strong dislike for her. Or maybe it was because it was fun to see what Amu could come up with when she helped out. Everytime she would do something different. It made Ikuto constantly wonder what she would try next time.

Amu skipped towards Utau.

"Utau-chan," Amu said, tapping on the blonde's shoulder. Utau turned around to glare at her.

"What?" She demanded, her violet eyes filled with annoyance. However she kept her arms wrapped tightly around Ikuto. "Can't you see that I'm busy right now?"

"Yeah..." Ikuto muttered, gasping for air as Utau tightened her hold. "Busy strangling me..."

Amu blinked.

"But Utau-channn!" She whined innocently. "You and I promised to help clean the house today!"

Utau sighed, glaring at the pinkette and letting go of Ikuto. Behind her back, Ikuto smiled and gave Amu a thumbs up. Amu pretended she didn't see. She still had to finish up.

"So come on!" She said sweetly. "Let's go!"

Amu ran to open the door and pull Utau in with her. As soon as the two girls were inside, a safe distance from Ikuto, the blue-haired boy poked his head in the house to get a quick look at the clock. He still had a good twenty minutes before his violin lesson began. Just enough time to run into a store and get Amu something for her good work.

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

Utau complained to herself quietly as she helped Amu clean. She really had promised to help, though she had assumed that the little girl wouldn't remember. Besides, the only reason she promised at all was so that Amu would stop bothering her and give her more "Ikuto time".

In a way, Amu really was like that little sister Utau always wanted but could never have. She was cute and constantly cheerful, but could be annoying sometimes also. Just like a little sister was supposed to be.

And today was one of those days Utau thought that Amu was downright annoying. How dare she? Interrupting her time with Ikuto. Couldn't Amu have remembered her promise just a couple minutes later?

Amu walked by, struggling with a heavy pile of books. She fell forward onto the carpet with a soft "mph!". Utau couldn't help but giggle a bit. That girl was just too adorable, even when she was falling down.

Still laughing a bit, the blonde bent down to help place everything back into a neat pile. Another person bent down to help also, but Utau didn't look up since she assumed it was either Amu or one of her parents.

The person silently handed Utau all the stuff from the mess he had gathered. All Utau did was mumble a quick "Thanks."

After they were done, Utau finally looked up at the person to came to help.

"Ikuto?!" She gasped. Truly, she felt touched. Ikuto had come here instead of whatever it was Ikuto's do to come help her. (A/N. Yeah... right...)

But Ikuto, however, payed no attention to her. He gently nudged Amu, who jumped up with a start. She relaxed instantly when she realized who it was.

"Ikuto?" She asked. "What are you doing here?"

Ikuto shrugged.

"First of all," He said. "My lesson's in about two minutes. I should be here anyways. But I needed to give you this."

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a giant lollipop, handing it to Amu. Amu looked at it questioningly.

"I owe you, remember?" He reminded her quiet enough so that Utau didn't hear. Amu's eyes widened.

"Oh yeah huh?" She mouthed, ripping the the wrapper off it it and sticking the lollipop in her mouth. Ikuto laughed at how it was too big for her tiny mouth, making her cheeks bulge out at the sides slightly.

Utau glared at Amu. Then she turned to Ikuto, however, her face immediately turned into a look of adoration.

"Ikuto?" She said, her voice sounding a lot more like Amu's than usual. "Don't I get anything?"

Ikuto frowned. He hadn't really planed on Utau asking for anything. He stuck his hands back into his pockets, frantically looking for anything he could give Utau.

"I dunno," He said flatly. "I guess I didn't bring it."

Utau pouted, eyeing the lollipop, which was still slightly sticking out Amu's small mouth. She grabbed the stick and yanked it out of Amu's mouth. Amu let out a cry of surprise.

"Hey!" She whimpered, tears brimming her eyes. "That was mine!"

Utau ignored her.

"If I don't get a gift from Ikuto," She said. "Then no one else can. And that includes you, Hinamori Amu."

Ikuto watched as a couple of tears began to slide down Amu's innocent face. He turned and gave Utau a disapproving stare.

"Utau," He scolded. "I wouldn't take that from her if I were you."

Utau shook her head.

"And why not?" She asked defiantly. Ikuto leaned closer to her ear.

"Because she licked that thing so the lollipop's covered with her germs," He whispered teasingly. To be honest, all he wanted to see was Utau gross out, plus... something he wasn't so sure of. There was something else he wanted, but he wasn't sure what it was.

But he got the first thing he wanted. Utau squealed in disgust, promptly handing the lollipop to a crying Amu. The pinkette's tear-stained face instantly lit up as she took the lollipop and stuck it back into her mouth.

Ikuto felt a smile forming on his lips. Something inside of him felt... happy.

Was he happy that he had just done a good deed? Or... was he happy that he made Amu feel better?

He felt his eyes wander back to the clock... and then he knew that he was five minutes late for his violin lesson. Ikuto jumped up.

"I have to go," He said suddenly, jumping up and towards the room where his lesssons were held. Just as he was about to open the door, he felt a small hand tugging on the hem of his shirt.

"Neh... Ikuto..."

Ikuto spun around and saw Amu, gripping his shirt in her hand and staring up at him with wide eyes.

"Ikuto..." She continued. "Why'd you help me? I thought that you'd help Utau instead."

Ikuto raised an eyebrow.

"Why would I help Utau?" He asked. "She's the reason you got that lollipop in the first place. I helped you because... You looked really unhappy that you got your lollipop taken away."

Amu shrugged.

"I don't know," She said innocently. "Utau-chan's so much better and so much prettier and so much-"

"No." Ikuto interupted her. "Utau's only prettier because she's older."

Amu's face lit up again.

"So when I'm older I can be just as pretty too?" She asked hopefully. Ikuto smirked.

"Sure?" He asked, shrugging. "Why not?"

Amu seemed completely satisfied with it. She skipped off to her own room, singing "I'm going to be as pretty as Utau-chan one day!"

Ikuto watched her for a few moments before going to start his lessons. That strange, warm feeling inside of him started again.

_Did I really help her for that reason... because she wasn't happy anymore...?_

_

* * *

_

**This chapter's done now :) Don't forget to review.**

**Last time I was complaining a lot... now I'm complaining that there isn't enough time in each day. Between eating, sleeping, piano, coloring manga, writing this, and reading / watching ****_Death Note_, I barely have time to breathe ._.**


	4. One Year Later

**Thank you bedendercat, sylvanicara, insulife, xhappily-randomx, tikki0112number2, xSkulls-n-Bonesx, Himeka Tsukiyomi, Blue Amuto, Hakumei. xo, RandomlyBoredWolfy, Snowrosex3, Rini-chan95, mikohoshina, brianaa-bby13, Neji0932, MaroonAngel of Darkness, mombo family, lemoncherrylove, Amuto20174, balloon . peppermint, HarunaNiwa073, Strawberry-Sonic-Babe, TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi, darkjewl, nana567, Random-Bubbles159, A-shadow-of-a-doubt, oxCuteKataraox, 9Otaku, Your Secret Admirer, XXXneko-sanXXX, serra1forever, amutoluvr1234, tsukiyomi arisa, Kaggie101, Hanami Kimori, AliceRosen, Natsuya801923, swe13te, animeluver714, Kags21, and DArkangel for reviewing!**

**Review replying time! :**

**bendercat: **Amu's cute, remember? Her adorable-ness is what attracted me to _Shugo Chara! _in the first place.  
**sylvanicara: **Yes yes, Ikuto. Feel the love :D  
**insulife: ***glomps back* :) I feel so loved now. Glad your day's better!  
**xhappily-randomx: ***sticks giant lollipop into your mouth* :D  
**tikki0112number2: **Well he had to fall in love with her at some point, no? 8D  
**xSkulls-n-Bonesx: **... It's my pen name o_o iSnowX3... or ~ i s n o w x 3 ~ . Really no need to be surprised.. considering my writing obsession. But I have a feeling this might die out soon o_o always six month interest span for most things. Video editing: six months; blogging: six months; writing: ? months  
**Himeka Tsukiyomi: **Yes it's very cute :)  
**Blue Amuto: **Yup.  
**Hakumei .xo: **Ikuto would be pwn-ful either way. The smirking just adds to it.  
**RandomlyBoredWolfy:** *faints with you* :DD  
**Snowrosex3: **... no. That made me think of those 4O year old perverted stalkers that go around raping little girls.  
**Rini-chan95: **I know right? 8D  
**mikohoshina: **You say you can wait, but I can't. I get bored really often. Me and my no life-ness.  
**brianaa-bby13: **Yep. It's a timeskip.  
**Neji0932: **Yes yes.  
**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **Lucky Ikuto then.  
**mombofamily: **Aw.. thank you :)  
**lemoncherrylove: **Thank you for loving it 8DD  
**Amuto20174: **I always upload but they're not good. D: Hopefully I'll still be able to upload during the school. San Fran and their minimal homework amounts. It wasn't two chapters in one day. It was two chapters in two days. I don't like uploading twice in one day. You're more awesome than I am awesome :D  
**balloon . peppermint: **They'll grow up when I say they do.  
**HarunaNiwa073: **Thank you :)  
**Strawberry-sonic-babe: **Awww D: I feel sorry for you and your lollipop. But then you got a bigger one so everything's okay now, no? I don't stress o_o I use this to fill my boredom needs.  
**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi: **D:! Don't freak out :O *self esteem lowers dramatically* Super mega giga glomp me...? Sure! :D  
**darkjewl: ***inhales and exhales* o______o"...  
**nana567: **Thank you :D  
**Random-bubbles159: **Big a big chapter?  
**Random-bubbles159: **You're not stupid D: ... Uh yeah let's go with that :)  
**A-shadow-of-a-doubt: **All little kids are cute... excluding my little cousin... who stole my phone and texted my ex-bf with it... :\ He's an evil nutjob.  
**oxCuteKataraox: **Updating now  
**9Otaku: **So? I'm Chinese and my grammar fails sometimes too :)  
**Your Secret Admirer: **But I just turned 13 back in March... Well at least your's a rumor. Mine was the real thing.. which ended pretty badly.  
**XXXneko-sanXXX: **"Too much well" ...? Do you mean "Much too well?" Because if that's the case, then I'll deny it :)  
**serra1forever: **I'm a bit afraid of germs too... *cough* SWINE FLU *cough*  
**amutoluver1234: ***falls down* :)  
**tsukiyomi arisa: **Well it's supposed to be a gradual change. There shouldn't be a dramatic difference.  
**kaggie101: **Updating now :D  
**Hanami Kimori: **Updating now XD  
**AliceRose: **Thank you! Updating now :3  
**Natsuya801923: **:D Yay. Well that's the whole point isn't it? Make the chapter really long so that everyone gets excited and then they find out that half of it is just replies :) Actually for now, Utau's parents are nameless. Yeah, Souka is "I see" in Japanese. Aw dang, it is? So I've been pronouncing it wrong my whole life then T_____T Well most music teachers are evil... *cough* piano teacher *cough* 18 is a big number, you know? D: Exactly. Ikuto's not really a playboy.. just people relate that with being perverted all the time. Childhood love! *hearts* D: Well in parts of the anime Utau was mean because Ikuto liked Amu better, remember? Yes yes. Ikuto's _very _interested in Amu. And of course Ikuto wants to. He wants to get her pregnant and then run away with her :) Bleh. I'll eat the way I want to eat.  
**Natsuya801923: **YESS. YOU ARE THE HUNDREDTH REVIEWER! Congrats 8D Summer went by so fast this year... Hm. Ikuto can't be like Amu's father. He has to be like her boyfriend D: I've got a little brother too, and he's a pain in the ass. I just realized that your reviews are really, _really _long compared to everyone else. I got one review that was only two words long, and your's are long :) But it's fine. I like long reviews.  
**swe13te: **Yes it was cute.  
**animeluver714: **Wittle Ikuto + wittle Amu = cute love :)  
**Kags21: **Thank you!  
**DArkangel: **No, I'm _not _doing a great job right now :)

**x_x so many reviews... I'm going for 1OO. A hun****dred with three chapters. New record for me 8D  
And next time can you guys make longer reviews :) It's so monotonous writing "Thank you!" for half of them because all you guys reviewed was "Update soon!" and "So cute!"**

**And by the way, I finally made a deviant art :) iSnowX3 . deviantart . com :DD I DEMAND YOU GO AND LOOK AT MY FAIL.**

**Just wondering.. do you guys like all these little childhood stuffs? Or should I just do one big jump to when both Amu and Ikuto are a bit older? If you guys do want, help me with some ideas on what to happen each year. I'm running out. And if we do continue year by year.. this is going to be a very long story. Six more chapters before I can get to tue actual planned parts.**

**_Ages:_**

**_Amu: 6  
Tadase: 7  
Utau: 8  
Ikuto: 11_**

**_Adults: old._**

* * *

Amu sat on the couch, playing with a ball of yarn as she watched Utau sit next to her, reading a book. As she tossed it around, some strand came loose and wound themselves in her fingers. Amu glared at the tangle of yarn, pulling some strings to try to get her fingers loose from the mess.

As she was trying this, she didn't notice the ball roll off her lap and onto Utau's book. Utau slowly picked up the ball of yarn, glaring at Amu.

"Do you mind?" She snapped. Amu stared back at her with wide eyes.

"Sorry," She whispered, returning her focus back to struggling with the string knotted in her fingers. Suddenly, Amu felt a pair of larger, warmer hands enclose themselve ontop of her hands, their slim fingers quickly untangling the yarn from Amu. Amu looked up and saw Ikuto, smirking down at her.

"I thought only cats played with yarn," He pointed out. "_Kittens_, to be exact."

Gazing at Amu now, Ikuto noticed that Amu did indeed represent a small kitten. The way her arms wrapped around her knees, which were tucked tightly under her chin. The way her wide, golden eyes were alert as they looked at everything around them. The way Amu was clutching the ball of yarn tightly in her right hand.

Still smirking, Ikuto sat on the other side of Amu; the side that Utau wasn't sitting on. He took a deep breath. A sweet scent entered his nose. Ikuto closed his eyes and continued sniffing the air and allowing his nose to lead him to wherever the smell was coming from.

He soon felt his face hit someting. Something really soft... and warm. He kept his eyes closed, pressing his face deeper into the scent.

"Um.. Ikuto?" Amu asked him. "What do think you're doing?"

Ikuto's eyes flew open and saw his vision completely blocked out by pink. He looked up and saw Amu staring at him with her honey-colored eyes. He turned back to look where he was looking originally and saw that his face was pressed into Amu's neck. There were also a few strands of Amu's pink hair in front of his nose.

He gasped, quickly pulling his face away. Amu had a slight tinge of pink on her cheeks. Ikuto smirked again, though his face was also slightly pink.

"So," He teased. "Not only are you a kitten that likes playing with yarn, but you're a _strawberry scented _kitten."

Amu curled up into a ball, putting on a cute pouting face as she buried her head between her knees.

"It's this new shampoo," She mumbled, her voice slightly muffled. "I think it's strawberry flavored."

Ikuto leaned over Amu again, breathing in the delicous smell of her hair. He made sure to hold his head just high enough so that Amu wouldn't notice him there.

Utau, on the other hand, noticed. She watched the whole scene from her spot on the couch, glaring at Amu the whole time. How did she get Ikuto to talk to her and give her so much attention, even when she was ignoring him?

She jumped and ran to sit next to Ikuto on the couch. Ikuto didn't notice; he was still so engrossed in smelling Amu's hair.

"Ikuto," Utau said sweetly, leaning over and resting her head on Ikuto's shoulder. "What does _my _hair smell like? I bet it smells better than strawberries!"

Ikuto reluctantly pulled away from Amu, leaning back to give Utau a quick sniff. Almost instantly, he pulled away, his face moving back to Amu's hair.

"Well?" Utau asked impatiently. "What does it smell like?"

Ikuto stopped sniffing for a moment, thinking.

"I don't know," He said, shrugging. "It smells like... hair?"

Utau frowned. She wasn't used to not being the center of attention. Why was it always Amu this and Amu that for Ikuto?

Amu suddenly uncurled herself from the ball-like shape she was sitting in, stretching a bit. She hopped off the sofa and skipped towards the front door.

"Eh.. Amu-chan?" Utau's mother said, stepping out from one of the other rooms. "Where are you going?"

"I wanna go outside and play!" Amu replied. Hoshina smiled.

"Utau!" She called out. "Go with Amu and watch her. I don't want anything happening to happen, even if it's just the front yard."

"But Mom!" Utau whined, sprawling out on the couch, giving Ikuto barely enough room to sit on it still. "I don't want to!"

Her mother sighed. Ikuto suddenly jumped off the couch and walked towards Amu.

"Hoshina-san," He volunteered politely. "I'll watch her."

Utau's mother nodded.

"That works too!" She said cheerfully. "Your violin lesson doesn't start for a while now, so I'll just come call you when it's time for you to come back."

Ikuto nodded. Amu smiled brightly and grabbed his hand.

"Well come on then!" She said excitedly. Ikuto grinned and allowed Amu to pull him outside. Utau suddenly sat up.

"I'll go too then," She called out, running behind Amu and Ikuto.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

"How about we make this side of the house a bit larger?" Ikuto suggested, grabbing another handful of sticks. He was helping Amu apparently build "an entire house of sticks." Of course, the whole thing was so far just a bit bigger than Ikuto's hand. But if Amu wanted to pretend, then he'd pretend with her. Utau just sat under a tree, watching the whole thing. She didn't feel like getting on her knees and building a stick house right now.

Amu nodded vigorously, agreeing with Ikuto.

"And then we can add some more rooms in!" She added excitedly.

"No. It needs much more than a few little rooms. It needs a _tower_."

Amu and Ikuto turned around to see who said that. Even Utau looked up for a moment, but as soon as she realized who it was she immediately lost interest.

"Oh." She said boredly. "Hey Tadase."

Amu looked confused.

"Who's Tadase?" She asked. Utau shrugged.

"Some kid who lives down the street," She muttered. "He used to come here alot since my parents and his are good friends. Amu, the reason you've never seen him before is because he was in France for a long time."

Amu turned and saw a boy about her height and age standing behind her. He had blonde hair, just a bit darker than Utau's.

"Actually," He said, seeming to be embarassed that the whole conversation was focused around him. "Our main home is in France. We just come here every few years and then and stay for around half a year before going back to France."

Amu stood up and smiled at him.

"Hi Tadase-kun!" She said cutely. "I'm Amu!"

Ikuto frowned. To be truthful, he had never seen this boy either. But there was no reason he should've, since he only comes around here for his violin lessons. But what got to him was that Amu called Tadase Tadase-_kun_. And she called Ikuto just plain "Ikuto". There was no "-kun" at the end of his name.

And why was that?

Here Ikuto was, on the ground wasting his time pretending to be totally interested in the stick house he was helping Amu, just so the little pink-haired girl could be happy and have some fun, and yet Ikuto can't seem to get a decent honorfic at the end of his name. In fact, he got no honorfic at all.

He tried to ignore it.

"So Tadase-kun," Amu said, making Ikuto flinch at the use of the honorfic. "You want to help me and Ikuto build the house? You can make the tower if you want!"

Tadase smiled at Amu, and settled down on the ground right in between Amu and Ikuto. Ikuto's frown deeper. Amu's warm little body was what was keeping his arm warm from the breeze blowing gently around them. And besides, he would rather have Amu next to him than this blonde guy that he didn't know.

Ikuto ignored both of them as they began to start a conversation together. Sooner or later, he ended up just sitting with Utau under the tree. All the fun had been taken out of the experience with Amu for him.

"Eh... Tadase-kun," Amu began shyly. Tadase looked up and smiled this princely smile in her direction. Ikuto almost groaned out loud. Amu had said that line countless times, and it would always would end with some random, flattering question for Tadase. Tadase would answer it patiently and modestly, but you could always tell that he was gloating about it inwardly. And no matter what he said, Amu would hang onto every word of it as if it were being recited from a Bible or something. It made Ikuto sick.

For the first time in the past couple of years, since Amu came, he wished his time with the pinkette before violin lessons would be cut short.

As if right on cue, Utau's mother stepped out from the house and waved in their direction.

"Ikuto!" She called out. "You're lessons are starting in five minutes, so you should come in now! And Utau, you come too. I need you to help me with something!"

Ikuto stood up and pointed to Amu and Tadase, who were still intently bent over the stick house.. or now castle since Tadase added the tower.

"But what about them?" He asked, trying to sound like he didn't care. Utau's mother stood there for a moment, watching them carefully, and then shrugged.

"Oh there's two of them out there now," She said casually. "I was only worried that something was going to happen to Amu if she was out there alone. But Tadase's out there too. They'll be fine if they stick together."

As much as Ikuto didn't want anything bad to happen to Amu, he would much rather have that than have her practically worshiping Tadase.

Utau ignored everyone and everything all together, skipping inside the house like her usual house.

"I'm going to take a shower, Mom!" She said over her shoulder, running into the bathroom before her mom could protest. As soon as she was in there, she dug through everything until she found the shampoo Amu had been using.

Utau smiled. She was going to use up half of this bottle.

**~ i s n o w x 3 ~**

Ikuto sighed as he walked out of the Hoshina residence. He had been in there for who knows how long, since his teacher got permission from his mother to stay a few extra hours to perfect the song he was working on.

The sun was setting as he walked past the front yard. Amu and Tadase were _still _out there, only the 'little' stick house they were working on had grown about five times bigger than when Ikuto was there. Now there was a giant wall surrounding the whole structure, multiple towers, and a four car garage.

Just as he was about to get into the car, Utau ran over to him and gave him a giant hug.

"Utau..." Ikuto muttered, annoyance filling his thoughts. Utau lifted up her head a bit, and Ikuto caught a wiff of her hair.

_It smells... just like Amu's hair... only the strawberry's too strong. How much of that freaking shampoo did she use?!_

"You're hair smells pretty," He said quickly, pushing Utau away from him. Utau released immediately.

"Really?!" She asked hopefully.

"Yeah sure," Ikuto said, already stepping into the car waiting for him. "Whatever..."

... but Amu's hair still smelled better to him.

* * *

**Review please :D And thank you guys so much for 1OO reviews!**


	5. Destiny

**Thank you XYNDiCATE, Your Secret Admirer, MaroonAngel of Darkness, Strawberry-sonic-babe, Neji0932, Animegirl67213, tiki0112number2, pikachuwolffox4, RandomlyBoredWolfy, mikohoshina, TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi, oxCuteKataraox, HarunaNiwa073, A-shadow-of-a-doubt, darkjewl, Pinkiie-Chan, SK8T3R-G1RL, Rabbit-doubt, Kaggie101, bendercat, ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat, Amuto20174, xhappily-randomx, Woo, Natsuya801923, Rini-Chan95, and ShellyCullen for reviewing!**

**Reply time~**

**XYNDiCATE: **Yeah I was planning on doing that. ... Hm. I never noticed that. *makes note to lay off on the cute stuff*. Thanks for pointing that out by the way 8D  
**Your Secret Admirer: **Thank you~ Um... well... to be honest I have no idea. I just write whenever I have a few moments to spare. And since it's summer, I've really got nothing better to do :) I'm practically on house arrest since my parents refuse to take me anywhere. But I swear, this is going to slow down once school starts again. And everyone's still going to be children.. just I'm skipping ahead two or three years.  
**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **Well he had to start getting jealous at some point, no?  
**Strawberry-Sonic-Babe: **Bleh... don't bother holding it in :D Just let it all outttt 8D. *Squeals with you* Well to be honest, I have a strawberry scented shampoo also ._. I tried a mass overload of it once and two of my friends spent two hours after that sniffing my hair. Yeah I'm going to skip a couple years ahead.  
**Neji0932: **... Don't hate him D: He's an important part of the story. *secretly hates him anyways* Well Utau's older than him... and she's still got an Ikuto obsession so I doubt she'd just drop that and run off to Antartica and marry Tadase. I'm skipping a couple years.. so yeah ._.  
**Animegirl67213: **Yup. I U-P-D-A-T-E-D 8DD  
**tiki0112number2: **Nope. You didn't spell that right. Je_a_lousy. And yes.. SADNESS.  
**pikachuwolffox4: **:D  
**RandomlyBoredWolfy: **XD *faints again with you* Chibi Ikuto always be better than Chibi Tadase. Remember.  
**mikohoshina: **Yepp. No life XD  
**pikachuwolffox4: ***chomps on strawberry* :D  
**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi: **D:! Don't die! DD: And I am doing a time skip. Three years. And no. I can't write one hell of a book. I'll fail :D  
**oxCuteKatarox: **Tadase's. Not. Gay. I don't know where that idea came from T_T I mean, I hate him as a person but that doesn't mean he should be gay.  
**HarunaNiwa073: **It's a lot of shampoo :3  
**A-shadow-of-a-doubt: **I did that once before. It's not too hard. You just have to find the right sticks and place them the exact perfect positions.  
**darkjewl: **Well what'd you expect? You wan't young adults parenting Ikuto, Utau, and Amu?  
**Pinkiee-chan: **So Utau and some shampoo is better than Amuto? XD jkjk  
**SK8T3R-G1RL: **Yes Tadase is going to get in the way.  
**Rabbit-doubt: **Well they were in the first chapter. I might stick them in again in some really random places, but I'm not sure about anything else.  
**Kaggie101: ** I go through other people's stuff D: So doest that mean I'm a bad person too? jkjk XDD And meh. It's okay if you do the 'Update soon thing'. Just make sure that that's not the whole review ._.  
**bendercat: **Yes he is.  
**ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat: **Thank you :)  
**ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat: **Thankies :D  
**Amuto20174: **Well... I've only got one thing uploaded on the account, and I swear it's a lot load of B.S. Look at your own risk. 8D  
**xhappily-randomx: **Ikuto is very jealous :)  
**Woo: **Thank you!  
**Natsuya801923: **Such a long review .____. Let's try to reply to all of this. My piano teacher's _evil. _I swear, once you start jumping two or three levels at a time you'll hate your teacher too. So much work DD: Really?! I've been pronouncing it right my whole life then :) Well since you're the hundredth, you _are _special! :D My brother's evil, and my mom said the same thing too. "He love syou so much. Why are you so mean to him?" Well he deserves it most of the time ._. Well you're replies are longer, since your reviews are HUGE. My deviant art is not good D: *lacks self esteem* And it is fail :) Plus I demand you go look at my epic failures XDD But you guys are all already doing that by reading my stories. I think I"ll continue with the childhood stuff, but just not do one for every year. Maybe skip a year here and there. Well congrats. You just guessed the idea for this chapter... well kind of. You were pretty close. *drops Natsuya into story and gives her a ball of yarn* :DD Have fun! I think it's _sub_consciously. Unconscious means they're knocked out ._. We don't want Ikuto like that right now. Utau's hair smells like hair. Yes yes. When they grow up, Ikuto's going to get Amu pregnant and they're going to live in a stick house :D Well I guess I can kind of know how Ikuto feels about the voilin. I'm having to go through the same thing right now with the piano. I use up half a bottle of shampoo pretty quickly too x) And Shugo Chara AMVs are awesome :) I should go watch more of them after I finish the chapter... Oh my god. What a long reply o_o  
**Rini-Chan95: **An-ti-way :) Cool.  
**ShellyCullen: **OHMYGOD. IT'S _THE _SHELLYCULLEN :OOOO lol sorry :) I've been a big fan of that _Hot or Not _story by you... even though whenever you upload I can't seem to find the time to review ._. I'll try next time. Anyways, thanks for reviewing! I always thought I had a problem with making Ikuto's love grow gradually, so it's nice to know I'm not screwing up on that.

**I kind of based the beginning of this chapter off of something that happened to me a little while back :) I burned my hand because someone spilled hot water on it... and the exact same conversation took place.**

**_Ages:_**

**_Amu: 9  
Tadase: 1O  
Utau: 11  
Ikuto: 14_**

**_Adults: Various older ages._**

* * *

Ikuto sighed as he entered the Hoshina's house for his violin lessons. He was here way too early again, so he hoped that it was one of those few days that Tadase hadn't come before him, so he could have some time with Amu to himself.

He slowly wandered around the home, curious to why he didn't hear Tadase's voice, Amu's laughter, or even Utau's annoyingly obsessive screams echoing off the walls.

As he walked into the kitchen, he saw Amu standing in front of the counter, slowly pouring some water into a large bowl. Ikuto smirked.

Silently, he crept up behind the pink-haired girl, who was completely oblivious to him as she poured the water. He leaned towards her ear.

"So whatcha doing?" He whispered, his hot breath blowing across the pinkette's face. Amu let out a gasp and jumped slightly, all the water spilling on to her hand instead of into the bowl. But she didn't say anything to him.

For a moment, Ikuto thought that Amu might be mad at him. But she shouldn't be; Ikuto had gotten into the habit of doing this most days. Scaring her before his violin lessons whenever Tadase wasn't around. Sometimes when Tadase _was _around too. But Amu wouldn't normally ignore him like this. If anything, she would yell and scream at him for surprising her.

Amu suddenly grabbed her sleeve and yanked it so that it stretched past her hand. She then stuffed her now covered hand into her jacket pocket, still refusing to look or talk to Ikuto.

"Amu...?" Ikuto asked slowly, a nervous feeling beginning to grow inside of him. "A-Amu!?"

Ikuto looked back at the water that was still in the bowl that Amu had been pouring the water into in the first place. There was a bit of steam rising from it.

His eyes widened. The water was hot. Very hot. He grabbed Amu's wrist, yanking her hand out of her pocket and looking at it. It wasn't hurt too badly, but it still looked pretty painful. The whole back of her hand was a light shade of red, some spots darker than some others.

"Amu?" Ikuto whispered frantically. "You okay?!"

Amu looked up at him, forcing a smile and nodded.

"It's fine," She assured him, though there were tears brimming at the corner of her eyes. "It just... stings a little."

Ikuto frowned at her.

"No," He said firmly. "You're not okay."

He gently held Amu's hand in his, observing it carefully.

"I'm fine," Amu protested. "Seriously."

Ikuto fingered the red sections of her hand. Amu winced every time his fingers came in contact with her skin. Ikuto leaned in even closer, staring now at her whole hand instead of just the red parts.

"How can this not hurt?" He asked incredulously. Amu's hand trembled slightly.

"It... just doesn't..." She lied, but Ikuto could tell. Her voice broke on the last two words, and a couple of tears dripped down her face.

Ikuto knew how she was feeling. She couldn't lie to him any more.

"It really does hurt, doesn't it?" He asked one more time.

This time Amu didn't try denying it. She began to cry, not even bothering to try to hide her tears anymore. Ikuto's expression immediately softened. He picked her up and ran down the hall into a bathroom.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Ikuto set Amu down so that she was sitting on the counter of the bathroom next to the sink. Amu cries began to quiet down as the blue-haired man placed her hand under the running cold water of the sink. Ikuto let go of her hand.

"Just keep holding your hand under the water, okay?" He instructed her gently. Amu nodded, using the back of her free hand to brush away the last of the tears. While she was doing that, Ikuto bent down and began digging through the cabinets under the sink.

"Come on..." He muttered to himself, digging deeper. "I thought I saw it in here once..."

At last, he found what he was looking for. Ikuto stood up straigt again, this time holding various tubes of stuff and a roll of bandages he found in the cabinets.

Amu felt kind of strange, allowing Ikuto to rub all that stuff from the tubes all over her hand when she had no idea what they were, but Ikuto must've known what he was doing since with the stinging pain in her hand gradually faded away. Somewhere along the way, Ikuto moved to sit on the counter next to her while still applying the stuff to her hand.

Amu closed her eyes and rested her head on Ikuto's shoulder. Ikuto stiffened for a moment, but then relaxed with a smile on her face and continued bandaging Amu's hand.

The pinkette's eyes flew open when Ikuto gave her hand a light squeeze.

"Well I think I'm about finished," Ikuto said, breaking the silence. "How you feeling?"

Amu looked up and smiled brightly at him.

"Thanks," She whispered, getting off of the counter. Ikuto stood up and followed her out of the bathroom.

"It was the least I could do since I was the one that caused it..." He said apologetically but brightened up again. "So anyways, what were you doing with all that hot water? You're not even ten yet and you're playing around with stuff like that."

Amu looked down at the ground, blushing.

"Actually..." She mumbled, barely coherent. "Tadase's coming over later today... and... I was t-trying to make him a cake..."

Ikuto felt all the air in his lungs vanish.

_It was all for... Tadase._

He sighed. Something inside him was telling him to help Amu with that cake. That it would totally make Amu's day if he did help. That Amu would probably hurt herself again if he didn't...

Ikuto took a deep breath.

"Well how much longer until Tadase's supposed to get here?" He asked. Amu glanced at the clock, her eyes widening in alarm.

"Oh my god, thanks for reminding me!" She said quickly, breaking off into a run towards the kitchen. Ikuto followed her, grabbing her good hand. Amu whipped around, her whole body tense from her panic.

"Don't worry," Ikuto said calmly, though his insides were going wild. "No need to rush. I'll.. I'll help you."

Amu's face lit up.

"Really?!" She asked hopefully.

Ikuto nodded. Amu smiled radiantly, making Ikuto smile also, despite him feeling like he was being torn up inwardly. Maybe he could make the whole experience better if he imagined that Amu was making the cake for him instead of Tadase...

He didn't get anymore time to think about it, since Amu grabbed his hand and pulled him along.

"Come on!" She said. "Even with you helping there's still a lot to get done!"

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Amu and Ikuto stood back and admired their work. Sitting in the center of the kitchen table was the cake the two of them had managed to make. It didn't look very professional, and it was a lot smaller than expected, but it was the best the two of them could manage with the little time they had. And considering it was only a 9 year old and a 14 year old working on it together, Ikuto had to admit they didn't do that bad of a job. Even though cooking isn't his thing... he just did whatever Amu told him to do and everything still seemed to work out perfectly.

"So Amu," He said. "You happy?"

Amu, who still had a huge smile on her face, nodded.

"Thank you Ikuto," She told him gratefully. "You were a really big help.. and it was more fun with you around."

Ikuto smiled. At least that was something.

All of a sudden, Utau's father walked into the kitchen and spotted Amu and Ikuto standing there.

"Ikuto?" He said, sounding a bit surprised. "You're here a little early. Oh well, I guess we can start your lesson earlier than usual then."

Amu suddenly ran up to him.

"Look!" She said excitedly, pointing to the cate sitting on the table. "Ikuto helped me make that for Tadase-kun!"

Utau's father smiled at Ikuto.

"What a good person you are," He congratulated the blue-haired boy. "Helping Amu out with something that means a lot to her!"

Ikuto plastered a smile on his face and tried not to let that last part bother him. He shrugged, grabbing his violin from where it was laying on a chair and followed his teacher out of the room.

As soon as they were gone, Amu's gaze travelled back to the cake.

_Come to think of it... Ikuto did a lot of the work. Even though he would only do what I told him to... he worked really fast and I took forever to get the smallest things done.... he was really a big help..._

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Ikuto tried his hardest to concentrate on his violin lessons. He really did. But unfortunately today, his teacher decided to leave the door to the room open a tiny bit, but it was just enough for Ikuto see exactly what he had hoped he didn't have to from where he was standing.

He had a clear view of Amu and Tadase, sitting side by side in the kitchen and eating the cake that _Ikuto _had help make earlier that day. And yet he had to stand here, innocently playing his violin while Amu shares the cake with someone other than him.

Sometime during the whole thing, Amu slid a slice of the cake onto a plate and stuck it under her chair, but Ikuto was too focused on his frustration to really think much of it.

"Well I think we're done for today."

Ikuto jumped, startled out of his thoughts. He turned and saw his teacher standing there, eyebrows raised.

"Something seems to be on your mind today," He said. "So I'm not going to ask you to stay later again. Go get whatever it is in your head out of the way and then be more focused next lesson."

Ikuto rushed out quickly and found Amu standing by the entrance to the house, waving outside.

"Bye Tadase-kun!" She called out. Ikuto flinched.

_It's been so many years... and still no "-kun"._

Just as Amu closed the door and headed off, Ikuto opened the door back up again. Amu turned around and smiled at him.

"Hey Ikuto!" She said in her normal cheerful tone. "Where are you going?"

Ikuto shrugged.

"Dunno," He said nonchalantly. "Home?"

Amu's eyes widened.

"You don't have to go yet, do you?" She whined childishly. Ikuto hesitated. There was no reason he shouldn't stay. Tadase had finally left, and no one was here to get him yet. Might as well stay for a little bit.

Amu grinned.

"Come on!" She said, motioning towards the kitchen. "There's someting I need to give you!"

Ikuto slowly followed her back into the kitchen, and saw Amu crawling under one of the chairs. The pink-haired girl soon stood up again, this time holding up the piece of cake on the plate she had stashed under her chair.

"This is for you," She whispered, her cheeks growing red as she refused to look at him. Ikuto smirked and took the cake. But he didn't even look at it. All of his attention was still focused on Amu, who's cheeks were still rapidly reddening.

"Ikuto! You're mother's here!"

Ikuto tore his gaze away from Amu and sighed.

"Thanks.." He said slowly. "I should get going now.. so.. um.. bye!"

Without waiting for an answer, he turned around and headed out.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

"Mom!" Ikuto exclaimed, surprised that today it was his mother picking him up. Souko turned in the driver's seat to smile at him. She eyed the plate and the cake in his hands.

"So Ikuto..." She asked casually. "Where'd you get the cake?"

Ikuto hesitated.

"From Amu..." He reluctantly answered. He spoke so softly that Souko almost couldn't hear him.

Unfortunately, though, she did manage to hear it. She stomped on the breaks in shock. Luckily, they were on an empty street so no cars were being blocked.

"Ikuto," She snapped. "I thought I told you to never talk to her again. How long has this been going on."

"I don't know..." Ikuto mumbled. "Ever since you last told me not to....?"

Souko glared at him.

"Mom please," Ikuto begged. "I swear that I'm going to run away with her and forget about my violin or something like that!"

Souko relaxed a bit.

"I'll always remember you said that," She told him sternly. "So you can't just decide to go off and do it someday."

Ikuto sighed.

_Someone's a bit paranoid..._

_

* * *

_

**Bleh. Not in a writing mood today so I'll just end it here.**

**Review please? :D**


	6. Perfect For You

**Thank you Strawberry-Sonic-Babe, darkjewl, xhappily-randomx, MaroonAngel of Darkness, 76987766554, Snowrosex3, Hakumei . xo, tiki0112number2, Neji0932, mikohoshina, Your Secret Admirer, bendercat, Pikachuwolffx4, Kiri-exorcist92, Autumn Misery, oxCuteKatarox, A-shadow-of-a-doubt, smileyz, Amuto20174, MsxMisunderstood, SK8T3R-G1RL, Kaggie101, mabbi, AliceRosen, Tsukiyomi-Amu, Demo Cello Lilin, 'Miya-chi', hyrule-rikku55555, lemoncherrylove, Rini-chan95, ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat, Natsuya801923, mombofamily, Wildeh, Tsuki's Angel, colourfulgurl, and TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi for reviewing!**

**Replying time! :O :**

**Strawberry-Sonic-Babe: **But in the end you still did squeal... oh well. *squeals with you*  
**darkjewl: **Really? I don't listen to much techno ._. *pop obsessions* And I've never listened to AltPunk either... *fails*  
**xhappily-randomx: **Just wait for it :)  
**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **By _indirestly _you mean _indirectly _right? o_o I fail. I was going to put Utau in but I decided to cut the chapter short so there was no Utau D:  
**76987766554: **Thank you!  
**Snowrosex3: **.... D:! *self esteem drops even lower*  
**Hakumei . xo: **Reminds me of the Kira-Kira kiss scene in Chapter 43 :)  
**tiki0112number2: **Just keep waiting x)  
**Neji0932: **Yes she did :)  
**mikohoshina: **Nope. Still with Utau and the rest of the Hoshina's.  
**Your Secret Admirer: **You have a twin sister? :O Cool. I have a stupid little brother ._. He's no fun. And how can anyone hate Ikuto!? I mean he's _Ikuto _for God's sake! DD:  
**bendercat: **Exactly.  
**Pikachuwolffx4: **Thanks!  
**Kiri-exorcist92: **Thank you!  
**Kiri-exorcist92: **... And thank you again :)  
**Autumn Miser: **Thank you~ ... Wow four thank you replies in a row .___.  
**oxCuteKatarox: **Just keep waiting for it...  
**A-shadow-of-a-doubt: **Well my mom's a little overprotetive too. No boyfriend until 25... though I've already broken that .__. Oh well. But I think the whole "all girl's school" thing is a little harsh.  
**smileyz: **Thanks x)  
**smileyz: **And thank you again :D  
**Amuto20174: **Well it's an Amuto story ._. And it can't be that without any Amuto, no?  
**MsxMisunderstood: **Thank you XD  
**SK8T3RG1RL: **Wow... so ironic :) Well I'm glad that none of your brothers got hurt!  
**Kaggie101: **No chara's... I have issues with writing about them ._. And I'm sorry, but Tadase wasn't a taste-tester. He was the cake-eater. DDD: B-But I _want _to reply to your reviews D:!  
**Mabbi: **Thanks!  
**AliceRosen: **I'm not sure yet. I'm kind of making up the story as I go... so yeah :\  
**Tsukiyomi-Amu: **:O! I don't know! DDD: Give me a hint? :D  
**Demo Cello Lilin: **Thank you x)  
**'Miya-Chi': **Thank you!  
**hyrule-rikku55555: **Thank you~  
**lemoncherrylove: **Well duh there's going to be more "moments" :O It's an _Amuto _story for God's sake.  
**lemoncherrylove: **Thanks XD  
**Rini-chan95: **Well just keep waiting then :)  
**ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat: **Thank you :3  
**Natsuya801923: **You're not last :) I would quit and find a nicer teacher, except she's the only piano teacher in the area I live in, so I'm stuck with her :\ I'm taking nine next year DDD: Lucky you. You got to quit at seven. Nine is so hard D: Well that's because parents think the younger one is so cute and innocent ._. "With a huff, and a puff, he BLEW the house down!" XD Aww... you get to play the violin? D: I've been begging my parents to let me switch from piano to violin for ages now ._. But sadly they said no. AMVorgasm is awesome :) And I think it's Mo0n12, not Mon12. Did you ever watch some of WhispersReloaded's Shugo Chara stuff? It's really good, though she's barely done anything for SC lately. And same here! That Kutau one AMVorgasm made was the first AMV I watched with the high-effects and everything. ShellyCullen really is awesome :) I love her stories. So creative. Well it wasn't too long ago, and the first time burning your hand isn't something you forget really easily. I was actually in Starbucks when a friend of mine accidentally spilled all of his drink on me. And then that conversation took place :) You can call me Snow-chan or Snowy. Lots of people call me either one already, so I've gotten used to it. You can just add water but there's some special stuff you can put on your hand to make the pain lessen and the burn heal faster. I learned the basics of making a cake when I was around 9, like how to make it really simple like a plain circle or something ._. But recently I've begun to fail at cooking... Yes yes, you do know it :) Hopefully there weren't any spiders under the chair... D: *checks under the chair I'm sitting in* And Amu will have to put a "-koi" after Ikuto's name. Sooner or later. Well this is America. Anything you say will always be held against you :\ Paranoid is a bit like over-reacting. Like you look at all the negative things in life and panic over them rather than enjoy all the positive parts. And that's not me :) I jacked off a music video and added the 'isnowx3' thing to it. I read most of the stories before hand, so all I had to was read the ones I haven't yet. And so many links x_x I'll check them out, but I'm not going to comment about every single one here.  
**mombofamily: **Thank you!  
**Wildeh: **Thanks!~  
**Tsuki's Angel: **Thank you! :D  
**colourfulgurl: **Thank you :) .. wow. Four thank you's in a row.  
**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi: **Um... thank you? And DANG. That's a lot of hair :O

**2OO reviews? Please? Onegai? .. and then all of a sudden I forget how to say it in the two dialects of Chinese that I know .____. Day em joo ah. I'll put it in once I remember what they are.**

**And I just remembered that I totally forgot about Tadase... he was supposed to leave a while back... and I already have the next chapter planned out and it has to come right after this one... hm... well then we'll just say that instead of a couple of months he stays in each house for a couple of years 8D I'm so smart.**

**_Ages:_**

**_Amu: 1O  
Tadase: 11  
Utau: 12  
Ikuto: 15_**

**_Adults: Still old._**

**Eh.. everyone's growing up :)**

* * *

Amu came home from school to find Ikuto, sitting on the living room couch. The case for his violin was lying open on the ground at his feet, while the violin it self was seated nicely in his lap. Ikuto had a small cloth in hand, vigorously attempting to clean off a spot he had found on his violin.

The pinketeu bit her lip to keep from laughing out loud. Ikuto looked so determined, so angrily frustrated over the small spot. It was almost like seeing the old Ikuto again.

She had noticed that for a couple of years now, Ikuto had slowly begun quieter and kept to himself more, barely giving most people more than a one-worded answer for everything. But he would still never give up a chance to embarass and tease Amu when the perfect timing and moment for it came up.

Amu didn't know if she should be happy or not about that. True, it was pretty annoying to have to look over her back every few seconds to check if Ikuto was following her or something, but it was also nice to have Ikuto not ignore her and give her the silent treatment like he did with everyone else.

Ikuto's head snapped up as soon as he heard Amu come in.

"The strawberry's home later than usual," He commented teasingly. Amu's cheeks turned a light red color.

"T-Tadase-kun asked me to help him with s...s-something..." She stammered. Ikuto smirked to keep Amu from knowing how he really felt about how she stayed to help _Tadase_.

Amu ignored the smirk and took a seat on the couch next to him.

"So whatcha' doing?" She asked, leaning over to get a closer look at the spot. Ikuto glared in the direction she was looking in.

"Stupid spot..." He muttered. "It's not coming off..."

Amu suddenly grabbed the violin and the cloth from Ikuto's hands.

"Let Amu try." She said, trying her best to sound professional.

Ikuto rolled his eyes. Half of him was interested in what Amu was going to do to try to get the spot that he himself couldn't get off for the past half hour. But the other half of him was scared that his violin was going to die in the process of that.

Amu raised an eyebrow.

"It's not like I'm going to kill your violin or anything," She said, as if she was reading his thoughts. "I'm just going to try to get that spot off."

Ikuto sighed. He guessed he would just have to trust her.

Amu rubbed the spot gently using the cloth. No change. She rubbed a bit harder. Still no change. Amu used the cloth to press as hard as she could against the violin as she rubbed. Ikuto winced as he heard the pressure from Amu's fingers squeak against the delicate wood.

And once again, no change.

Ikuto's eyes widened in shock. In one fluid motion, he snatched his violin and the cloth away from Amu again.

"I asked you to help me _clean _my violin," He said, still horrified. "Not to murder it!"

Amu frowned.

"Oops..." She trailed off, trying to think of any way that she could be of some help to Ikuto without being a disadvantage to him also. Something about not being able to help bothered him.

Her eyes suddenly brightened.

"Wait here!" She told Ikuto, jumping off the couch and running into the room where the blue-haired boy had his violin lessons. Luckily, no one was in there when she snuck in.

Amu quickly headed towards the row of cabinets along the back wall, opening each one in turn while looking for a specific bottle that Ikuto needed. At last she found it, sitting with the other violin stuff Utau's father kept in the cabinets.

She grabbed the bottle and pulled it out, careful not to move or tip anything else over while doing so. The last thing she wanted was to get caught going through someone else's stuff.

"Ikuto!" She called out while running back to where Ikuto was sitting on the couch, waiting patiently for her return. "I found it!"

Ikuto raised an eyebrow as Amu stood in front of him and took the cloth he was holding from his hands. The pinkette then sprayed a ton of the liquid onto the cloth. Afterwards, Amu placed the cloth back on the spot on the violin, rubbing it back and forth with the ever-so lightest touch. When she removed the cloth, the spot had completely vanished. Ikuto stared at her, mouth wide open.

"What is that stuff?" He asked incredulously. "And how'd you know to use it?"

Amu shrugged.

"I found it in one of the cabinets in the music room," She said, sounding like she did absolutely nothing wrong. "And I've seen Utau's dad use it to clean a violin lots of times. I thought that maybe I could help if I got you some of that too for your violin..."

Ikuto grinned.

"Well you were a lot of help," He said encouraginly, causing another bright smile to flash across Amu's face. "So thanks."

He glanced at the clock hanging on the wall. Couple more minutes until his voilin lesson began. Ikuto got off the couch.

"I've got violin lessons now," He told Amu, frowning as the girl's happy expression fell.

"Oh," She said softly, turning around to walk away. "Well maybe I'll see you before you go home after your lessons then."

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Ikuto sighed as he left his violin practices. Even after hours and hours of practice, when the time for his teacher to hear the song, it would almost feel like all his practicing had gone to waste. So many mistakes and errors could be found, both major and minor. Whatever they were, Ikuto felt like inwardly hitting him each time since he wasn't able to find them himself.

"You might feel like there's a lot of mistakes now," His teacher had told him. "But you're doing a lot better than people your age, and better than some people a bit older than you, too. Just wait, with a skill like that you're going to be famous one day."

If 'becoming famous' required this much work and self-inflicted damage to his self esteem, then Ikuto didn't want to be famous.

Just as he was about to open the door to leave, he spotted Amu, coming out of the bathroom with soaking pink hair and a pretty short night gown. Amu saw him looking, for she smiled and waved him over.

"Ikuto?" She yawned. "You're still here? It's so late..."

Ikuto looked at the clock. True, it was pretty late for someone Amu's age. Sometimes when Ikuto ended his lessons, Amu would already be fast asleep in bed.

But not tonight.

Amu blinked a few times, looking less an less sleepy with every blink.

"So when are you planning on going back home?" She asked, trying her best not to sound nosy. Ikuto shrugged.

"Do you want me to stay any longer?" He asked her back. Amu thought for a moment.

"If you want..." She told him quietly. Ikuto pulled a phone out of his pocket, quickly dialing his house phone number. After a couple of rings, Souko picked up the phone.

"Ikuto?"

"Yeah," Ikuto said into the phone. "It's me. Do you think I can stay at the Hoshina's a little longer and practice the song a bit more?"

He could almost hear Souko hesitate on the other line.

"But it's so late..."

"I've been here later before, Mom. I'll be fine," Ikuto assured her.

"Okay then... I'll be over in an hour to pick you up."

Ikuto hung up the phone, smiling at Amu.

"I'm staying then," He said, suddenly remembered something.

"Come to think of it..." He murmured. "After all these years you've lived here, I've never seen your room before..."

Amu shrugged, motioning for him to follow her up.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~  
(A/N. And this is where I start getting sleepy, so sorry if the writing sucks.) **

"Wow..." Ikuto said, walking into the room. "It's so... pink."

And he was right. There wasn't anything in this room that wasn't pink. Pink bed frame, pink carpet, pink walls, pink blankets and pillows, pink desk, pink chair, pink curtains. Heck, even the inside of her door was painted pink.

Amu grinned and nodded.

"Pink's my favorite color," She told him, grabbing a pink comb off of the desk and running it through her pink hair. Curious, Ikuto bent down and sniffed Amu's hair. He smiled at the scent.

"And it still smells like strawberries," He announced. Amu's face turned a bit red.

"S-Stop sniffing my hair!" She yelled at him, grabbing a pillow and throwing it at his face. Ikuto expertly caught the pillow mid-air, lightly tossing it back to where it belonged on the bed.

"So that's the whole reason you let me up here?" He joked. "So you could kill me using a pillow?"

Amu, whose cheeks were still red, shook her head.

"No..." She said shyly. "Actually... I was hoping you could play some of your violin for me."

Ikuto's eyes widened. Was she serious?

"I mean," Amu continued. "Whenever I want to hear you play, I always have to go press my ear against the wall of the room you're playing in or something like that. I never get to just sit there in front of you and watch you..."

Ikuto nodded in understanding. He knew what she was talking about. Without aying a word, he opened up the violin case, pulling out the violin and beginning to play.

Amu flopped backwards onto her bed, her eyelids slowly beginning to fall over her eyes. She was already tired, and Ikuto playing the soft and sweet tune of a lullaby wasn't really helping her with staying awake much longer.

She closed her eyes, not yet asleep, but just laying there to enjoy the beautiful music. Subconisciously, Amu had begun to hum quietly along with the tune, and soon her humming grew louder and louder. Louder to the point where it was almost the same volume as the song Ikuto was playing.

Ikuto suddenly cut off the song, staring at Amu as a thousand thoughts ran through his brain. Amu sat back up again, blinking away all her sleep as she stared back at him.

"Why'd you stop all of a sudden?" She complained. "It was such a nice song."

Ikuto didn't answer. He suddenly brightened consierably.

"Amu," He asked. "Can you sing? Like at all?"

Amu thought for a moment.

"A little..." She told him slowly. "But I don't really take actual singing _lessons_. I just sing every now and then for the fun of it."

Ikuto shrugged. It was good enough.

"But why are you asking anyways?" Amu asked him, a cute little confused expression on her face. Ikuto smirked at her.

"I'm going to ask," He said. "If you can do a singing duet with my violin."

Amu blinked a couple more times.

"But why would you want to do that?" She asked. "You're violin already sounds really good on it's own."

Ikuto raised an eyebrow at her. Did she really not know?

"Well," He lied. "You're voice sounded really good too right now when you were humming along with my violin. So I was thinking that maybe we could do something like that together..."

Amu smiled and nodded slowly. She liked the idea a lot.

"Sounds great," She said, yawning again. "But can we ask tomorrow. Too... sleepy..."

Ikuto grinned. He picked up his violin again, continuing the slow lullaby from where he left off a few minutes ago. This time Amu didn't hum along with the song; she was asleep after five minutes of it anyways.

Smirking, Ikuto adjusted her position on the bed to make sure she would be comfortable and properly tucked into bed before leaving.

"Good night, Amu," He said quietly before leaving.

Tomorrow would be the day.

* * *

**2:15 in the morning. I don't feel like staying up any longer.**

**Review please :)**


	7. Finally Now

**Thank you A-shadow-of-a-doubt, miki-chann, oxCuteKatarox, ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat, Pinkiie-Chan, TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi, Random-Bubbles159, MaroonAngel of Darkness, 'Miya-chi', Amuto20174, tiki0112number2, amutofan4395, SK8T3R-G1RL, AliceRosen, xhappily-randomx, BlueAmuto, Pikachuwolffx4, 4everIkuto, Rini-chan95, Neji0932, smileyz, xXStrawberryVanillaXx, Natsuya801923, 769877665544, ShellyCullen, Autumn Misery, Your Secret Admirer, cuppycake1216, and Holy Angel Heart for reviewing!**

**Replyinggggg :O**

**A-shadow-of-a-doubt: **College?! I feel so small now :\ Starting eighth grade this September.  
**miki-chann: **Well don't ask me. And adults are old. And then when the kids get older, the adults will still be old. Hence forth the 'still old'.  
**oxCuteKatarox: **I couldn't sleep :) So I stayed up and tried to finish the chapter.  
**ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat: **IKUTO IS NOT A CHILD MOLESTER DD: He's just... very perverted. That's all XD  
**Pinkiie-Chan: **Souko has an important part later on.. and later on isn't now so just wait :)  
**TsukiyomiAlikutoMissaWatusi: **But all the other times you don't spell sweet wrong X) OHMYGOD. I _hate _Zac Efron ._. Please don't pull your hair out.  
**Random-Bubbles159: **Thank you :)  
**Random-Bubbles159: **So your name's Emmy? Emmy's a pretty name :) So much better than Joyce ._. And I don't think you should know... because to be honest, I don't know either :D  
**MaroonAngel of Darkness: **Yes yes. Our little Ikuto is growing up. *cries*  
**'Miya-chi': **Well it's not going to end anytime soon. That's all I know ._.  
**Amuto20174: **... Noooo.  
**tiki0112number2: **Immaturity :)  
**amutofan4395: **Well they're growing older, aren't they?  
**SK8T3R-G1RL: **Lots of people in this world are pains in the butt. You get used to it after a while.  
**AliceRosen: **Shamu is awesome :D And yeah you do wonder alot...  
**xhappily-randomx: **It's great, no? :D  
**BlueAmuto: **Well... I don't know :)  
**Pikachuwolffx4: **Thank you~  
**4everIkuto: **Thank you!  
**Rini-chan95: **Thanks x)  
**Neji0932: **Don't stab them D: I still love Utau.  
**smileyz: **It's going to come later in the story. Just wait for it :D  
**xXStrawberryVanillaXx: **Ah, I see. Like your new penname 8D  
**Natsuya801923: **Well long reply time. Yeah you are 199th, but you wre the 1OOth and that's good enough. I practiced for three hours today o_O I'm not going to even try for any longer. Well it's only sticks. Tadase could probably kick it over if he wanted to ._. I found the sheet music for Ikuto's first violin song once... but I didn't even play the violin so I disregarded it was someting utterly pointless to me o_o *tries to dig it up again for you* ... But I'm not responsible :) I just want to quit piano. I've watched both of theirs :) So awesomely awesome. I love her stories too :D I only go there because I live within walking distance of a Starbucks.. and a Jamba Juice and a Tapioca Express... but it's been too hot lately so I haven't went in a while. Mkay then call me Snowie :) Yes yes. www. whatever link here :D And yeah I speak Chinese. Cantonese :DDD It's awesome being able to speak Cantonese in a city with people that only speak Mandarin. But I speak both anyways, so it doesn't matter for me. No actually it's Tadamu.. sorta.. in the next next chapter. Yes my teacher drills me all the time. I can't go play ten seconds of the song without her pointing out the tiniest, most insignifigant mistake ._. My room's that pink... And I was half asleep D: Everything I wrote seemed bad to me. And I don't know ._. I started up this habit of naming each chapter off a song from an artist. So then all the chapters from this story are named after So Nyeo Shi Dae songs o_o It's a weird thing that I do. And I was running out of good names, so this one fit the best :DD  
**769877665544: **OHMYGOD. YOU'RE THE 2OOTH REVIEWER!!!!!! *faints* So awesome :D Anyways, thanks for reviewing, Mr. / Mrs. 2OOth Reviewer 8DD  
**Shelly Cullen: **.. Nooooo! Don't kill anyone DD: I'm updating!  
**Autumn Misery: **It'll be next chapter... or something. It depends. But it'll be soon x)  
**Your Secret Admirer: **Having a twin sister would be totally cool :O I want one of those... even if she hated Ikuto.  
**cuppycake1216: **I use strawberry-scented shampoo :)  
**Holy Angel Heart: **Thanks! And I love your penname.. it sounds so awesome :D

**THANK YOU :) THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR 2OO REVIEWS. 6 Chapters = 2OO reviews. New record for me :DDDD I love all of you guys.**

**Eh... going on vacation tomorrow DD: So sad. Be back Monday D: I honestly don't want to go. At all. It's going to waste one of my last weeks of summer vacation. Plus next summer my dad already found me a job at his office. So I'm going to have like... _no time_.**

**_Ages:_**

**_Same as last chapter._**

* * *

Amu sat up in her bed and yawned hugely. She stared out the window, watching the sunlight shine on everything outside. Today was must going to be a normal day.

Then she remembered what Ikuto had said about today, and her whole face brightened considerably.

She stood in front of her closet, trying to decide what to wear. Ikuto was coming over again today, and this time she wanted to make sure she looked nice.

"Now I could wear this shirt..." She murmured to herself. "But I don't have any skirts that match it right now..."

Another hand came up from behind her, reaching into her closet and pulling out a shirt from the way back. It was a white t-shirt with black sleeves, and a kitten with dark blue fur biting into a strawberry on the front.

"Wear this one," A husky voice whispered into her ear. Amu jumped and turned around. She gasped when she saw Ikuto, standing there with a huge smirk on his face.

"Ikuto?!" She exclaimed. "W-Why are you here so early? Your lesson isn't until the late afternoon today, right?"

"I always get here early, remember?" Ikuto reminded her. Amu raised an eyebrow.

"But never this early!" She pointed out. "Seriously, why are you here?"

Ikuto shrugged.

"I got bored," He said, smirking. "So I thought I'd stop by and bother you. And you might want to stop screaming. I passed by Utau's room on the way up and she's still asleep."

Amu frowned at Ikuto.

"Whatever!" She said, her voice dramatically lowered. "Anyways, why do you want me to wear this shirt so badly?"

Still smirking, Ikuto pointed at the cat, who's fur Amu just noticed was the exact same color as Ikuto's hair. He then pointed at the strawberry, the dark red color beginning to fade away, leaving only a slight pink.

A pink that was the exact same as Amu's hair.

Once Amu understood what Ikuto was trying to say, her frown turned into a horrified glare.

"IKUTO!" She shouted. "YOU PERVERT!"

Ikuto's only response was collapsing onto Amu's bed, laughter shaking his whole body.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Utau giggled as Ikuto placed two fingers under her chin, tilting her head up and staring straight into her eyes.

"Utau," He whispered, causing the blonde's cheeks to turn slightly red. "I love you..."

She gasped.

"Ikuto!" Utau squealed, throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him close. Ikuto smirked is famous smirk before leaning in to kiss her. Utau closed her eyes when-

"IKUTO! YOU PERVERT!"

Utau jumped up in bed, eyes wide. When she regained consciousness of her surrounds, a feeling of dreaded sadness overcame her.

_It was just a dream... all of it was a dream. Ikuto never told me he loved me and he never tried to kiss me..._

Rubbbing her eyes sleepily, the saddened twelve year-old climbed out of her bed and went to go find the source of the noise.

"Ikuto!" She heard someone whimper. It was followed by a different voice laughing.

Utau raised an eyebrow. All of this was coming from Amu's room. She ran across the hall, banging on Amu's door.

"Amu!" She yelled. "Open up!"

The noise inside the bedroom immediately silenced. Utau tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for someone to open the door. Finally, she just opened the door herself and gasped at what she saw.

There lay Ikuto, sprawled on Amu's bed, arms wrapped tightly around the pink-haired girl's arms and waist with his head in her lap. Amu, on the other hand, wasn't so calm. She was thrashing her legs in no particular direction, desperately trying to free herself from his embrace.

Utau blinked. She'd rather not hear about what was happening in there. But she knew one thing. Amu didn't want Ikuto in her lap, and Utau wanted him in hers. So everything worked out perfectly with each other.

"Neh... Ikuto..." She said innocently, taking a seat next to Amu on the bed. "Amu-chan keeps trying to get away from you when you sleep on her lap, no? Does it bother you?"

Ikuto thought for a moment.

"It would be better if she stopped moving around," He said, his voice muffled because he buried his face into the skirt Amu was wearing. "But other than that, it's fine."

Utau paused and smiled sweetly at them. while Amu tilted her head in confusion as she stared at Utau.

_What is she planning?_

"So Ikuto," Utau continued. "Why don't you use _my _lap instead? I'm not going to fight back."

Amu smiled.

"Yeah, Ikuto," She said. "Why don't you go to Utau?"

Ikuto lifted his head up to give Amu a look that clearly showed he thought the pinkette was deranged in the mind. He shrugged, dropping his head back onto Amu's lap and replaced the shocked expression on his face to one you would normally see on a pouting child.

"No," He said in the most immature voice he could manage. "Amu is so soft and warm and cuddly. Ikuto wants to stay here... even if Amu does kick him every now and then."

Amu let out an exasperated sigh and sent Utau a look of desperation. Utau, on the contrary, was glaring at Amu, jealousy and hatred filling her eyes.

"Ikuto!" Amu tried one more time, whimpering loudly. "Can you get off of me?!"

She stared straight at him, making her honey-colored eyes extremely wide and innocent looking. When Ikuto rolled over to look at her, he already felt his stubborn will to stay the way he was slowly begin to crumble away. Amu looked so irresistible, so childishly adorable...

"Oh, come on!" He groaned. "Can't I stay like this for five more minutes?"

Amu shook her head.

"No." She said in a pouting tone that matched Ikuto's. "Now get off me."

Ikuto suddenly sat up, pushing Amu's small body towards Utau as he got off the bed and took a seat on the pink carpeted floor.

"Fine," He grumbled. "Be that way."

Amu stuck her tongue out at him.

"I will, pervert," She retorted.

All of a sudden, there was a loud knock on the door.

"Amu-chan," The voice on the other side said. "Are you awake? It's so noisy in your room."

Amu jumped up to open the door. Standing in the doorway were Utau's parents, eyeing the noisy room curiously. But their looks of confusion turned into looks of understanding once they saw Utau and Ikuto sitting in the room also.

"Eh, Ikuto-san?" Utau's father said. "What are you doing here? Your lesson isn't for a while now, isn't it?"

"That's what I said," Amu muttered, loud enough for Ikuto to hear but not anyone else. Ikuto smirked at her comment.

"Actually," He said, standing up and wrapping an arm around Amu's shoulder. "I was going to ask you something."

Amu glared at the arm, but didn't say anything about it. Not in front of Utau's parents.

Utau's father raised an eyebrow.

"Well," He said. "What did you want to ask then?"

Ikuto glanced at Amu, as if to ask her one last time if this was okay was her. Amu nodded and gave him a reassuring smile. Ikuto took a deep breath and turned back to Utau's parents.

"I want," He told them. "Amu to sing along with my violin."

...

Everyone was stunned into silence for a moment. The only sound that coul be heard was the rustling of the fabric of Amu's shirt when Ikuto gave her shoulder a comforting squeeze.

Utau's mother was the first one to speak up again.

"That's a wonderful idea!" She exclaimed approvingly. "It'll be such a nice experience for the two of you!"

She turned back to her husband.

"I mean," She said, a bit embarassed. "If it's okay with you. You're the teacher after all; so you should be able to decide what's best for Ikuto."

"What's best for Ikuto?" Ikuto muttered under his breath. He said it only loud enough for Amu to hear. "You mean: what's best for how famous you guys are going to get once he makes Ikuto famous."

Amu gave him a questioning glance. It almost sounded if he didn't want to become famous.

She shrugged, and made a mental note to herself to ask him about it later. She was sure that Ikuto would have a logical explaination for all of this.

"Well..." Utau's father finally said. "If Ikuto and Amu really want to, then it should be okay. But remember, Ikuto, you still have to be on top of your other songs, too. You've got a violin competition coming up, and I expect you to do well in it."

Ikuto nodded, sending a thankful smile in his direction.

"Thanks," He whispered.

Utau, who was sitting silently on Amu's bed while watching the whole thing in shocked horror, suddenly jumped up.

"Wait a minute!" She said angrily. "Why _Amu_? I mean, I can probably sing tons beter than Amu can. Besides, Amu's just a kid! It wouldn't look good for Ikuto if he was performing with some _kid. _He should obviously seen playing the violin with the singing of someone who can match his expertise!"

Her father frowned, thinking hard. Everything that Utau had just said made perfect sense.

Her mother, on the other hand just stood there, already slowly inching out of the doorway. Almost as if she didn't want to take a side and just preferred to stay out of the whole arguement alltogether.

And Ikuto glared at Utau, protectively pulling Amu closer to him.

"Utau." He warned the blonde sharply, sending an anxious glance in Amu's direction. The pinkette's expression was unreadable, as if she had a smooth mask on her face covering all the chaos and turmoil inside of her.

The truth was, Amu knew that everything Utau had said was true. Utau could probably sing better than her, since she still believed that Hoshina Utau was better at everything. Plus, Utau really was older.

Utau's father spoke up again.

"Well then maybe Utau should be the one singing," He suggested. "There's probably a better chance that it'll turn out good that way."

"No." Ikuto snarled, pressing Amu even closer to him. Amu looked up at him.

"Ikuto," She whispered. "It's okay. Really. I'm fine if you guys would rather have Utau sing it."

Ikuto frowned at her.

"I wouldn't be fine with it," He pointed out.

Utau's father didn't hear that.

"Okay," He said. "Since it's fine with Amu, then it's settled. Utau can sing it."

Utau squealed happily, sending a gloating simrk in Amu's direction. Ikuto looked totally pissed off with the situation.

Utau's mother was the only one who noticed that.

"Actually," She said softly. "I don't think it's for us to decide. Ikuto suggested this after all, and it's going to be Ikuto that plays the violin. I think that he should be the one that gets to say who sings."

"Thanks," Ikuto mouthed in her direction. Utau's father nodded in agreement.

"You're right," He said. "Ikuto should get to pick."

He turned to Ikuto.

"So who do you pick?" He asked. Ikuto smirked, practically hugging Amu now.

"You know who I pick," He said simply. Utau glared at everyone.

"Fine!" She yelled, stomping out of Amu's room and walking back to her own room. Her mother sent a worried glance in that direction.

"I hope she's not going to throw another tantrum," She pleaded to herself as she briskly walked out of the room and followed Utau.

Utau's father looked at the two of them, and shrugged.

"I think..." He said awkwardly. "I should go see how things are going with them..."

Ikuto blinked at Amu.

"Actually," He admited. "I should get going too. I kind of... uh... snuck out... and my mom's going to figure out that I'm gone soon. I don't want her to think I've been kidnapped or something."

Amu laughed softly and then nodded. Ikuto smirked, leaning down to give Amu a quick kiss on the forehead before leaving.

"P-Pervert!" Amu stammered, cheeks flushed. "What was that for?"

Ikuto laughed.

"I just wanted to see your reaction," He said.

_And I just wanted to kiss you... And finally now, I can say that I've done that before..._

_

* * *

_

**Review please :O**

**I'm going to be on vacation again. Wednesday - Monday. I don't know if I'll have internet during then, but I know for sure I won't be able to update. So review for me while I'm gone, okay? :DD**


	8. I Love You

**... *poke poke* Anyone still here? x)**

**Well I'm giving a shot at reviving this story :) Don't want me to? *points at **_**new**_** poll on profile page* Be my guest and take your pick then.**

**Not going to reply to any reviews this time around, since most of them are just "OHMYGOD. DON'T DISCONTINUE!!!", and to be honest, I really have nothing to say to those reviews. I'm dead serious. But I promise I will try to reply next time around :) Oh, and thanks for my three hundred reviews. I love you all 8D **

**And the lyrics for the song were **_**really**_** hard for me to write :\ Since the song was in Korean, I found an English cover of it on the site I download my music on, and I had to do all the lyrics **_**by ear**_**. Considering I'm probably half deaf, it was really hard :( Ah well. If you want the song, check my profile. It'll be there, just waiting for you to click on it :)**

**Ages:  
Amu ~ 11  
Tadase ~ 12  
Utau ~ 13  
Ikuto ~ 16  
Adults ~ Older than ever :)

* * *

**

Amu stood in front of the mirror, frowning. She adjusted the black ribbon in her hair, and then reached up to play around with it some more. Ikuto and Amu were going to perform again later that night, and Amu wanted to look absolutely _perfect_.

"You know," A voice behind her said. "If you keep messing around with it like that, it'll never look right."

Amu whipped around, and saw Ikuto, leaning on the door-frame of her bedroom. As soon as Amu noticed him, he straightened up and walked towards her.

"But if you ask me," Ikuto continued. "I think it should be like _this_."

In one quick tug, he pulled the ribbon completely out of her hair all together. Amu glared at him through the mirror.

"Hey!" She protested. "Do you know how long it took me to get that in there?!"

Ikuto just ignored her, and placed the ribbon back into her bubblegum-pink hair. Only it was in a completely different place than where Amu had put it.

"Doesn't that look better?" He asked. Amu could only nod; he was right, but she hadn't even looked at herself in the mirror yet. She was too busy looking at the other person in their reflection.

Ikuto was standing behind her, and he was in a tux. A tuxedo. Something that Amu had barely seen in her life before, much less on someone as good-looking as Ikuto.

Amu had to admit it to herself, Ikuto looked really good in that outfit. It had been almost a year since Ikuto and Amu had decided to do a singing / violin duet together, and they both benefited a lot from it. More people than ever knew about Ikuto now, and some of them were even being friendly to Amu. But the one thing Amu loved the most was that she and Ikuto had grown closer together during all the time they were together. Ikuto's level of pervertedness had skyrocketed, but Amu had learned to get used to it. It was like a mutual thing between them.

Besides, she kind of liked all the attention that Ikuto was giving her.

"Amu?" Ikuto asked, waving a hand in front of her face. "Amu? Are you alive?"

Amu snapped of her thoughts and smiled at Ikuto.

"What?"

"I said," Ikuto repeated. "Do you like it better now?"

Amu gazed into the mirror again, this time at herself instead of Ikuto. She smiled.

"It looks great!" She said happily. "Thank you Ikuto!"

Ikuto smiled at her, but he felt a stab of guilt. He had known, ever since Amu came to live with the Hoshina's, that he was just supposed to be somewhat of an older brother figure to Amu. After all, it was pretty obvious that everyone expected him and Utau to get married when they were older.

But he couldn't help but think that his emotions for the two girls were reversed. Amu could make him smile just by smiling by herself, while Utau... well Utau couldn't make him smile at all in the first place.

"You nervous?" Ikuto asked suddenly, breaking the silence. Amu averted her eyes to the ground as a small, shy smile emerged on her face.

"I guess... kind of..." She mumbled quietly. Ikuto gave her another encouraging smile.

"You'll be fine," He said, squeezing her shoulder gently. Amu's head suddenly lifted itself back up, staring at Ikuto with wide, honeycomb eyes.

"But what if they don't like me?" She whispered. Ikuto almost laughed.

"Well why wouldn't they like you?" He asked. "I mean, it's not like you're really bad at singing or anything..."

Amu only shook her head and slid a step closer to him. Ikuto gazed down at her, noticing that he was actually _a lot_ taller than her now. When they had been younger, the difference hadn't been very noticeable since everyone thought of both of them as short. But, now Ikuto could see it without even trying. What surprised him the most was that he hadn't noticed it before.

Now why was that?

Before Ikuto could think of a logical answer to his own question, a voice interrupted him.

"Ikuto-san! Amu-chan!"

The two of them turned around and saw Utau's mother, hurrying up the stairs and standing outside Amu's room.

"Amu-chan," She exclaimed again. "Iktuo-san, you guys have to get going now!"

Ikuto turned back to Amu.

"Well then," He said, his voice softening the slightest bit. "You ready to go?"

Amu shook her head, staying put where she was.

"What if they don't like me?" She asked for the second time. Ikuto couldn't answer that question. How was he supposed to explain to a little 11 year old girl that most people will love her just for being that young and having the guts to get up there and sing. And that Ikuto wouldn't know what Amu could do to make them dislike her, since Ikuto hadn't particularly hated Amu for more than a fraction of a second in his life.

He just smirked.

"If they don't like you," He promised. "Then I'll go personally hurt them."

This seemed to make Amu feel somewhat. She offered Ikuto a shy smile, and followed him out of her room.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

_If there was one chance  
You could be anywhere close to me,  
In a perfect world, that chance will come.  
But, it's all just a dream..._

_If I should say what's on my mind,  
If I said it line by line,  
Would you care to, try to understand,  
Or would you just turn your head?_

_Countless times that I have tried  
To bring myself closer,  
But, every time, I'd find  
That I'm hiding behind a face you'd never know.  
Afraid to show,it's hurting me,  
But I can't let it go..._

_Like a fool, I fell behind,  
Deep into your shadows,  
And watching you from afar.  
Someday, somehow, I will let you know that  
I love you~_

_If one day, I was able to spread my wings,  
And fly to you.  
If I reached out, would you take my hand,  
Or am I asking for too much?  
Countless times that I have tried  
To bring myself closer,  
But, every time, I'd find  
That I'm hiding behind a face you'd never know.  
Afraid to show, it's hurting me,  
But I can't let it go..._

_Like a fool, I fell behind,  
Deep into your shadows,  
And watching you from afar.  
Someday, somehow, I will let you know that  
I love you~_

_Countless times that I have tried  
To bring myself closer,  
But, every time, I'd find  
That I"m hiding behind a face you'd never know.  
Someday, somehow, I will let you know that  
I love you~_

_I... love you._

Smiling widely as the crowd applauded, Amu slowly made herself back to the area behind the stage; Ikuto following closely behind her. Ikuto couldn't help but feel somewhat satisfied. He was right; Amu didn't mess up even once during the whole song. If anything, it was _Ikuto_ that messed up a few times here and there, and he had no idea why. Maybe it was because he was tired, having give up all his free time outside of violin practice to fool around with Amu, maybe he was distracted by some unknown cause, or maybe he just made a mistake because his finger slipped.

He didn't know.

When Ikuto and Amu got back, they were greeted by the usual; the people that were always waiting backstage for them. Utau's parents, her mother with a huge smile on her face, and her father with some sort of "constructive criticism" for Ikuto's violin, and then Utau herself, who just wanted to be able to glomp Ikuto at some point tonight.

But this time, there was one other person. Standing behind the Hoshina's, was Hotori Tadase.

As soon as Ikuto noticed this, his eyes immediately snapped to Amu, who was staring right at Tadase. Just like Ikuto expected; he didn't even know why he was surprised anymore. It's been this way for years, when Ikuto was around, Amu would treat him like he was the most important thing in her world, but once Tadase decided to show up, Ikuto would be shoved aside for him.

Ikuto didn't like it. Not one bit.

"Tadase-kun," Amu said, a polite smile on her face. "What are you doing here?"

Tadase didn't return the smile.

"Can you come with me for a second?" He asked. "There's something I need to tell you."

Amu's smile faded away, but she nodded and followed him down the hall, out of Ikuto's and the Hoshina's view. Ikuto took a step to follow them, but a firm arm stopped him.

"Not so fast," Mr. Hoshina said sternly. "Ikuto, you still have to tell me why you messed up so many times during the song."

Ikuto frowned at the ground.

"It was only a couple..." He muttered. Utau's father glared down at him.

"Only a couple?" He repeated. "If you count three minutes out of a seven minute song 'a couple', then yes, you made a couple mistakes."

Ikuto raised an eyebrow at him.

"You were keeping track?" He asked. His violin teacher shook his head impatiently.

"That's not the point," He said in an exasperated tone. "The point is that you screwed up so many times in one, simple song."

Ikuto barely heard him at all after that. He eyed the direction that Amu and Tadase had disappeared suspiciously, wishing he could be over there instead of being stuck over here. His mind filled with millions of things the two of them could be talking about right now. It seemed that with every new idea that popped into his mind, the more evil his imagination was to him.

"Well," Utau's father snapped. "You understand now?"

Ikuto blinked a few times, startled. He had thought of everything from rape to Tadase admitting he was gay when this man just interrupted him. Not that he heard any part of his lecture anyways.

"Sure..." Ikuto mumbled. Mr. Hoshina stepped back, a grin on his face.

"Much better," He said. "Just do better next time, got it?"

Ikuto didn't hear him; he was already speeding down the hall to find Amu and Tadase.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

"So Tadase," Amu asked. "What was it that you wanted to tell me?"

Tadase had led her outside, behind the building and by a small dumpster. Amu wondered what was so important that they needed to be so far away from everyone else for her to hear it. Tadase turned around to look at her, his ruby eyes dead serious.

"Hinamori-san," He said. "My family and I... we're going back to France."

Amu's eyes widened.  
"Really?" She whispered. "When?"

"Next week," Tadase answered. Amu frowned.

"Tadase-kun," She said. "I'm... I'm really going to miss you..."

Tadase offered her a small smile.

"I'm going to miss you too," He told her. "So before I go, I want you to know that.... Hinamori Amu, I love you."

Amu felt like all the breath had been knocked out of her. She couldn't breathe, she couldn't move, she couldn't answer. She was in shock.

"So you two were _here_ the whole time..."

Amu and Tadase both whipped around and saw Ikuto, casually standing there with his trademark smirk on his face.

"Amu," He said, motioning her over. "Come on for a second."

Tadase opened his mouth to protest, but closed it when he saw Amu walking towards the navy blue-haired teen. Once they were a little bit away, Ikuto bent down so that his eyes were at the same level of Amu's.

"Amu," He said. "What happened? What did he say to you?"

"He said.... " Amu replied, still sounding quite dazed. "He said that he loved me. He really loved me."

Ikuto frowned. This wasn't fair. This wasn't fair at all.

_.... Well. I loved her first. You hear me, Tadase? I. Loved. Her. First. I just didn't want to look like some freaking pedophile and tell her that when she was like... five._

"Amu," He continued. "Say no."

Amu snapped out of whatever trance she was in.

"No?" She echoed. "But why?"

Ikuto took a deep breath. He hadn't planned to tell her for a couple more years, but he figured he'd have to say it now if he wanted to be able to say it at all.

"Because," He said. "Amu, I love you, too."

* * *

**WHOOPDEEDOO~~**

**o_o somebody's on crack....**

**ANYWAYS, thanks for reading this chapter x) It was kind of strange, writing this after staying away from this story for a whole three months.**

**Ah well. It's midnight, and Joyce is sleepy, so please review ! :D**

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	9. Kissing You

**Hi :D**

**Well, I'm updating again, since I've got nothing better to do. I spent the **_**entire **_**day on Tumblr today, well other than using three hours to go watch 2012. Day well spent.**

**Anyways, I'm not going to update **_**I Just Wanna Kiss**_**. In fact, I'm thinking about just removing that story off of fanfiction all together. I don't see how I'm going to be able to continue that story. It's already got some hate :\**

**As for the song-fics, I'm doing those on my own time. Besides, they're barely getting ten reviews each anyways. No point in writing / uploading something that only 10-20 people are going to read anyways.**

_**My Star**_**'s going to be updated next, though. Unless I get that BAMM ! inspiration to do one of the newer stories (which I still encourage you to vote on :D)**

**Added yet another choice onto the poll. God, I'm on a roll :O So many new ideas in a few days…**

**Ruiko: **OMGOMGOMG NOT AMAZING aw :)

**Himeka Tsukiyomi: **Thank you ! And don't forget to update your stories, too. I like them ~

**KittyPrincessKirara: **Updating x)

**Phomma: **You'll see ;)

**JeZra_Amutolover110: **… I'm sorry, but I've never heard of that story before. Ever o_o And I couldn't have wrote it if I don't even know of its existence.

**Shokara N' Strawberries: **As for a lot of people.

**ArtGrrl-Sunna Bluecat: **I had to reread the whole thing too, just to remember where I left off, LOL.

**Linblueneko: **Updating now.

**Angelawsomecake: **Guess. What. I. thank. You. For. Reviewing. xD

**Dittoeevee8888: **._. Um… okay. Thanks?

**Chika Tskyoski: **I'm trying :O

**BerryHinakoto: **Or maybe, it's Amuto angst :) You never know, and neither do I. I'm just winging it.

**Otaku-for-life: **Your welcome :D

**Soccerluver04: **YES. FINALLY SOMEONE THAT AGRESS WITH ME :O ! Shugo Chara ! Party ! can go die. I'm wasting half an hour of my life every week to see some fluff, not some cosplayers.

**xXStrawberryVanillaXx: **Aww;; thanks.

**Wildeh: **Ouaah to you too xD

**Miki-chann: **"Comeback" That reminds me of all those singers that like, totally disappear off the face of the Earth; and then come back with something totally great.

**Miruku-chii: **Updating~

**MysteryPearl: **Happiness ! :D

**Hanami Kimori: **YES. IM UPDATING.

**CharacterClover: **I know right? I'm so proud of myself for thinking of that phrase x)

**Snowiisan: **Updated _My Star_.

**Kaggie101: **… That gave me like, the perfect idea on how to continue this story. THANK YOUS.

**Bendercat: ***dances with you* =)

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**76987766554: **HI ! :D

**Yoru-chan-Amuto-freak: **I'm glad I did too.

**HarunaNiwa073: **Wheee ! :D Let's go love them together, eh?

****TwilightAngel**: **Hopefully, I'll be able to finish this one. Can't say the same for _I Just Wanna Kiss, _ though ._.

**Neji0932: **Keep reading :D

**MiyakoEenYurFace: **I probably have carpal tunnel by now, lol. I'm always typing _something_, whether blogs, stories, review replies, or just IMing.

**Yeahnotloggedin: **This gave me another perfect idea on how to continue this story :O THANKS TO YOU TOO.

**Evilmasterminds13: **Aw to you too xD

**Rini-chan95: **Reminds me of this song I was just listening to a few min. ago;; "Kick Start" by JLS. _So girl now you wanna go, kick start the drama_…

**AngeloftheRain: **o_o you don't sound very happy… I SHALL CHEER YOU UP !

**Hinazuki Miu: **OH YESH I DID.

**Kiri-Exorcist92: **Ikuto the pedo :)

**MoonlitDreamers: **… Why would you be crying? o_O It wasn't like this chapter was particularly sad or angsty or anything…

**Kitty-Neko-Chii: **I'm not awesome. You should see a friend of mine write. _That_ is pure genius.

**Amuto fan: **Thank you !

**Dark Midnight Dream: **:O omg cookie ~~

**Xhappily-randomx: **You'll see. Just wait and see.

**Yumi-echizen: **Cutness is love.

**Oh, poo. Going through **_**three**_** pages of reviews just to reply to every single one of them is not fun. At all. But still, I appreciate every one of your reviews and all the feedback you give me xD**

***Same ages as last time*

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**

Amu's shocked face broke into a wide smile.

"I love you too!" She said cheerfully. Ikuto felt his whole body relax.

_Well… that was easier than I thought it would be._

Still smiling, Amu turned around and skipped away.  
"Wait, Amu!" Ikuto called after her. The pink haired girl turned around to stare at him questioningly. "Where are you going?"

Amu blinked.

"To go tell Tadase that I love him, too, you silly person!" She exclaimed. Ikuto stared at her, wide eyed, as his jaw dropped.

He felt like screaming, hitting his head against the wall next to him, anything painful.

"T-Tell him?" He asked in a strangled voice. "Why?"

Amu's happy smile slowly faded away.

"Huh?" She asked, confused. "What's wrong with telling him?"

Ikuto _really _felt like hitting his head against the wall. It took all of his willpower _not_ to.

"Because…" He said in a slow, emphasized tone. "You just told me that you loved _me_. Not him."

Amu's confused expression grew even more confused.

"But..." She asked. "What's wrong with loving everyone? I mean, you love your friends, you love your family, you love everybody, don't you?"

Ikuto stared at the girl in utter shock.

_You have got to be kidding me…_

Amu frowned at him.

"Is something wrong?" She asked him timidly. Ikuto took a deep breath and shook his head.

"Nope," He said, trying his best to keep his voice level. "You know what? Just go. Go tell Tadase whatever it was that you were going to tell him."

Amu stared at him for a moment, thinking that he didn't really mean that, but turned around and took off to find Tadase. As soon as she was gone, Ikuto turned around also, and really hit his head against the wall. He did it multiple times, feeling somewhat satisfied when his mind went numb for those few seconds afterwards.

_Seven years. I love her for seven freaking years, and this is the thanks I get._

"Don't do that," A different, gentle voice said behind him just as Ikuto was about to hit his head once more. "You're going to hear yourself…"

Ikuto turned around and saw Utau, standing there staring at him with her wide violet eyes.

"Stop hitting yourself," She said again. "I don't know why you are, but just stop it."

Ikuto stiffened as he felt her thin arms wrap around him tightly.

"Utau…" He trailed off. Utau shook her head, burying her face into his black shirt.

"It's nothing," She mumbled. "I just thought you might need a hug."

Ikuto sighed.

_Yes, yes I do actually need a hug. Just not from you. From… Amu…_

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Ikuto slipped into the large Hoshina residence, hoping he wouldn't have to run into Amu or Tadase while he was going to his violin practice. Ever since Amu had found out that she only had a week before Tadase had to leave, she had been spending as much time as possible with them. Which, obviously, irritated Ikuto to a great extent. If Amu was going to love "everybody", she might as well treat everybody fairly as well.

Just as he was walking through the front door, he was almost run over by a frantic pink haired girl.

"Amu?" He asked, grabbing her shoulder. "Why are you… uh… panicking?"

Amu turned around to stare at him.

"Because," She practically screamed. "Tadase-kun's leaving today and I overslept and I need to get there before he checks in so I can say bye!"

With that, Amu pushed past Ikuto and continued her frenzied running down the street. Ikuto frowned.

_Just relax, Ikuto. I mean, he'll be gone by tonight. Then you'll have Amu all to yourself again…_

Mrs. Hoshina's head poked out from one of the many rooms of the house. When she saw Ikuto standing there awkwardly by the front door, she ran over to him.

"Ikuto-san," She said. "You're lessons are cancelled today. Mr. Hoshina's sick. But he said if you didn't keep practicing, you're really going to get it once he's well again."

Ikuto couldn't help but smile at that last part. That, and the fact that he had the rest of the day to himself now. It wasn't he was going to practice much today; he would save that for the night before his next lesson.

Which meant… he could go follow Amu around for the time being.

He smiled at Mrs. Hoshina.

"Thanks," He said, already headed out of the door. He really _was_ thankful; he would be putting the afternoon to good use instead of wasting it trapped in a room with an angry man and a violin.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Amu ran around wildly in the airport. She had always hated places like this; they were so big and crowded, and Amu would always get lost in them. She risked a glance at her watch. If she remembered correctly, Tadase's plane was supposed to leave in less than an hour.

She was beyond panicked right now.

"Tadase-kun," She whispered to herself as she continued her search. "Where the heck are you?"

"Um… Hinamori-san?" A voice behind her said. Amu whipped around and saw Tadase, standing there with his normal princely smile on his face.

"Tadase-kun!" Amu exclaimed in relief, returning the boy's smile. Tadase eyed the pink haired girl in front of him.

"You look like you were in a huge rush," He commented. "Did something happen?"

Amu shrugged.

"Not really," She admitted sheepishly. "I just… overslept. That's all."

Tadase couldn't help but laugh.

"You really haven't changed at all," He told her warmly. "Not at all in the five years that I've known and been around you."

Amu felt her cheeks heating up.

_Is that supposed to be a compliment or an insult?_

"Um… thanks," She murmured anyways. Tadase's smile grew.

"And I meant that in a good way," He assured her. "I like you the way you are."

Amu's cheeks jumped a few shades redder.

"R-Really?" She managed to stammer. Tadase nodded.

"Yeah," He said. "Look, I've got a little bit of time before the plane takes off. How about we go into there for a little bit?"

The blonde haired boy pointed to a small drink shop inside the airport. Amu's face lit up and she nodded.

**~ i S n o w X 3 ~**

Ikuto stopped once he was inside the airport to take a look around. He was really in no rush; he knew that when Amu panicked like that she was normally overreacting.

And she was this time also, in his opinion. Amu worrying about anything that concerned Tadase was an overreaction to Ikuto.

Thinking that he could kill some time, he walked into one of the shops that were housed inside the airport. Maybe he could get a little something to eat or drink; or just buy something totally useless to give to Utau to get her to shut up for another day or two.

The first shop Ikuto went into was one that sold small drinks. Unable to think of anything better or more useful to do, he bought a small chocolate drink and sat down at one of the empty tables. His gaze swept around the rest of the shop. Everyone else in the shop was pretty boring. Some were reading, others were trying to calm their fussy children, and others were just… sitting there. Just like Ikuto was at the moment.

That is, all of them except for_ one _table's people. Ikuto stared at them for a moment longer, trying to be certain if he was really seeing those two people.

Amu and Tadase.

They were sharing table in the far back corner, their seats unusually close to each other. Both of them had a small cup in their hand, and were drinking out of them when they weren't talking with another.

Ikuto narrowed his eyes at the sight. Amu's cheeks were a shade of red that could rival the shade that he himself could make them by teasing her. But this time, he wasn't the one behind it; it was Tadase. And Ikuto didn't like that.

Tadase then said something, too quiet for Ikuto to hear from where he was, and Amu giggled. Then, Tadase rolled up one of the sleeves of his jacket, and checked his watch. His happy expression faded at the sight, and so did Amu's. Tadase said something else to Amu, and forced an encouraging smile on his face. Amu did the same.

Ikuto looked around, and noticed that the bathroom was right next to their table. Maybe, if he could pull this off, he could pretend that he was going to the bathroom and listen in on what the two of the, were saying.

Standing up, he swept some of his navy-blue hair in front of his face to cover up who he was, and then started towards them. He was walking at a rather hurried pace, suddenly slowing down when he was next to his table.

"Hinamori-san," Tadase was saying. "I have to go now, but don't forget that I'll still love you."

He leaned down, and gave the wide-eyed pinkette a full kiss on the lips.

Ikuto bit his lip and hurried past them into the bathroom.

_Tadase did not just kiss her. He. Did. Not. Just. Kiss. Her. I mean, he's like twelve, and Amu's even younger than that. They're not supposed to be kissing yet! That's _my _job!_

For a few minutes, Ikuto took a few deep breaths to calm himself down. And then he walked out of the bathroom.

Surprise surprise, they were _still_ kissing out there. Well, it was more of Tadase kissing, Amu was just sitting there shocked.

Ikuto glared at Tadase.

_Hotori Tadase, if you ever come back to Japan after this, I swear to God that you're not going to make it out of here alive.

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**Bleh. Horrible chappie D:**

**Review? Onegai? :D**

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